 Dearest Friends @ CAS,
Thousands of apologies for the big, big gap in CASonline in 2010 .... worldly work is both scary and punishing, you all know that !!
Also, the last few issues dealt with controversial, difficult matters. We have no wish for CASonlines to be known as the Buddhist e-letters specialising in sour-ness and bitter-ness !! But ,again, somebody got to speak, loudly AND truthfully !!
You may also be glad to know that we are far from slipping into obscurty as what we lost in VIRTUAL REALITY, we more than compensate for in the REAL WORLD. See "5 - Support DPF Section".
Always with the Dharma, buddies !!
bb & every living creature @ CAS ( in Happiness !! )
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What's in store ?? 1 Excellence:
- The 13th Dalai Lama - The 14th Dalai Lama
1.5 Teachers' blessings The late Trijang Rinpoche speaks about our Root Teacher
3 Quote/s from the Buddha's holy scripture: - Brahma the "Creator" beseeches Lord Buddha
- The General becomes an Arahant
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The Sure-Steps to Enlightenment: Completion Stage ( postponed !! )
5 Support Dharma Propagation Fund ( DPF ) - Special Projects:
Agent Orange in Ho Chi Minh City and others
6 You got to know this !! REALLY Ugly Stuff & the horrible shugdenites 7 For Friends of CAS:
( too many precious things to detail here ) ____________ 1 - Excellence
The Great 13th Dalai Lama
Once social proceedings got under way, His Holiness was very warm and friendly and smiled a great deal. In an unusually low, guttural bass voice, he asked Derrick various questions. Were His Majesty the King- Emperor ( of good health ourselves ?? Had we had a good journey ?? The only thing that seemed to upset Him was that we had sailed down the Tsangpo ( River ) in a yak-skin coracle. "Oh, but you should not have done this," He said with great concern. "It is so dangerous." And He begged us not to do it again. He was concerned to know whether everything was to our satisfaction at Dekyi Lingka. Were we happy there ?? Were we being properly looked after ?? In fact His whole concern throughout the entire interview was for our welfare. We were the ones that mattered to Him; He did not seem to think about Himself at all. For the first time in my life I seemed to have had the good fortune to meet a genuinely selfless person?.... I am not a Buddhist. I have been a Christian all my life, yet there was an atmosphere in that little chamber. Something emanated from His Holiness. He was clearly a deeply spiritual man, and yet, as I have said, spiritual in a very down-to-earth sort of way . "That was quite remarkable !!" I said to Derrick as we remounted the ponies ( after the audience ). I felt strangely uplifted, every perception clear as a bell, the world around me radiant. ( Memoirs of a Political Officer's Wife in ____________ ( The 14th Dalai Lama )
Eye to eye with the Dalai LamaBy Ward Serrill, The Seattle TimesSeattle, WA (USA) -- "The eyes are the windows to the soul," says an old English proverb. I am about to look into a pair of eyes that will change my life.
The 14th Dalai Lama walks into the room and sweeps his gaze across the dozen or so people standing around, bowing slightly to each of us, his hands pressed together in blessing. I smile at him, which he returns as he sits for the interview. I expected a larger man. One always does with someone bigger than life. But here sits this humble leader, short though amply fleshed with round features. He looks healthy like a 71-year-old baby. His head is shaved, his eyebrows dark. He listens with open eyes, a ready smile under the surface, taking in, quietly, all. We have created a small set to do an interview for a television special on Buddhism in America. I marvel at my luck. Here I am where hundreds of thousands of devotees would clamber to be, a few feet from his Holiness, with nothing to do but observe and listen as I hold the boom pole and microphone. For 24 minutes I observe, ignored by all, invisible as a bird in the shadows. I see this: He never anticipates an answer. He listens as if for the first time and his answers defy expectation. Attempts to get him to comment on the West's obsession with materiality and its conflict with Buddhist principles fail, though he does say that we in the West try on religions as we do hairdos.I watch his hands. They are small and slightly chubby, bright pink on the palm side. He gestures with them, often guiding his words to their destination. He pulls his feet up beneath himself and sits cross-legged as if he will stay all day, though we all know in minutes he will be swept away to see some world leader, speak to 15,000 people or go have lunch with Richard Gere. When asked what America can possible give to Buddhism, he exclaims, "Ah, new question!" And then answers that perhaps it is the influence of women on the religion ?a that traditional Buddhism is having to learn and adapt, recognizing it might need to change. When asked about his religion of kindness, he replies, "... all these things: compassion, charity, patience, forgiveness, joy; these do not belong to religion. One does not need religion to understand or practice them. They are simply the expressions of what it is to be human." The interview is over. I no longer wish to be invisible. I don't know what I want to say, but I want to connect with him. The three of us on the film crew are at the side ready to tear down equipment once the room clears out. As if he heard my wish, the Dalai Lama walks over to give each of us a personal greeting before leaving. Anxiety rips through me like a torn piece of paper. I struggle to figure out something to say. We don't speak a word. As he moves in front of me, my hands involuntarily reach out to grasp his. As our hands meet he looks up into my eyes and my world stops spinning. His eyes reveal a deep gravity. I see the serious work behind his childlike humor and spontaneity. The man has suffered much and discipline has made him into a spiritual warrior. This is serious work, these eyes tell me, this inner work to discover peace and being. His attention is riveted. In this moment he is not a busy spiritual leader but simply a human looking gravely into the eyes of another. In this moment I see his greatness. It is this: Humility is not a discipline; it is not a practice with him. Humility is simply what he is. I see in this moment of eyes meeting that he is incapable of placing himself above or below me. I am stunned by the reality of our equality. And then he is gone, swept out of the room by his handlers. For the next three hours I am nearly incapable of speaking, stunned as I was with the presence of this understanding. We are, he told me in his silence, his brown eyes gravely looking into mine, our hands clasped, in absolute attentiveness ... we are ... he said, in those eyes, looking into mine ... the very same soul. ------------
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1.5 - Teachers' Blessings
It was the early 1980s.
The late Trijang Rinpoche, His Holiness the Dalai Lama's Junior Tutor, peered from His teaching throne for an unusally long time at the then Gyudmey Khensur Lobsang Nyima ( later becoming the 100th Ganden Trisur ). Khensur Rinpoche, appearing somewhat shy or uncomfortable at His teacher's stare, looked down quietly at the floor in front of him.
Trijang Rinpoche then suddenly said, "Lobsang Nyima is not an ordinary monk." Repeating himself again, "Tsawa Lobsang Nyima ( Lobsang Nyima from the Tsawa hostel of Drepung Loseling ) is not an ordinary monk." The entire congregation of monks in Namgyal Monastery, HH the Dalai Lama's personal monastery, was taken very surprised at what Trijang Rinpoche said of their Abbot, which was completely out-of-topic of what Trijang Rinpoche was teaching at that time. Trijang Rinpoche then continued from where he left off in his teaching as though nothing has happened.
Several decades later, we all understood. Trijang Rinpoche has forseen the greatness of Rinpoche. Rinpoche was enthroned as the 100th Ganden Tripa, the Official Head of the entire Gelugpa lineage, the largest of and the most influential of the 4 main schools of Tibetan Buddhism, miraculously almost, levitating-up the long list of formidable abbots before him to become the 100th successor to the throne of Je Tsongkhapa, serving out fully his term: 7 years as the Ganden Tripa - the Official Head and 7 years as the Ganden Trisur - the Official Head Emeritus. Rinpoche has fulfilled Je Tsongkhapa's prophecy that He will return as the 100th incumbent of His holy Throne of Ganden.
( Tenzin C., attendant to the 100th Ganden Trisur, Dharamsala )
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3 - Quote/s from the Buddha's holy scripture
____________ The General becomes an Arahant Once there was a Rebellion against the king which one of his officers sucessfully suppressed. The king was immensely pleased and rewarded him handsomely ..... For several days he was allowed to relax and enjoy himself, which he did with good food and wine, and the dancing girl was so beautiful and danced so gracefully that he eventually fell madly in love with her. One morning as he was on his way to the river to take a bath, he ran into the Buddha and his disciples going on their almsround and bowed casually as a sign of respect. The Buddha smiled and said to Ananda, "That officer will come to see me later today, and after I have preached to him, he will attain full enlightenment and then die. That officer will today realize Parinibbana. The officer, however, had no idea what was in store for him that day. He continued entertaining his friends on the banks of the river, enjoying himself immensely. He was dizzy with delight as his lissom dancer ceaselessly swirled and twirled for their pleasure and amusement. That evening, however, the dancer collapsed from excessive exhaustion and died. The officer felt so grieved that he went to the Buddha for some comfort and relief, his eyes still wet and swollen from all his weeping. The Buddha told him that the tears he was shedding due to his loss was nothing compared to the amount he had already shed throughout his previous lifetimes. "Isn't it time to stop?" the Buddha asked him. "Desire is the root of your sorrow. Why not get rid of that and have no more sorrow?" At the end of the Buddha's discourse, the officer attained arahatship. Soon after that, as the Buddha had predicted, he died. The bhikkhus were curious to know whether the officer was a bhikkhu or a brahmana since he attained Parinibbana in the clothes of a layman. The Buddha said that he could be called both because it was not by external appearances that one became holy, but by whether one's mind was pure and free from greed, hatred, and delusion. Even though he may be well dressed, if he is calm, free from defilements with his senses controlled, established in the holy way, perfectly pure, and has laid aside enmity toward all beings, he is indeed a holy man, a renunciant, a monk. From "The Dhammapada"
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4 - "The-Sure-Steps- ( Meditation on the Ngag Rim - rough, authentic notes. )
TOPIC Ten - Completion Stage: ( Postponed pending leisure and better use of the precious Human Rebirth )
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5 - "Support Dharma Propagation Fund ( DPF ) - Special Projects"
Infinite gratitude on behalf of all our beneficiaries to our Dharma Friends for your continued support and blessings.
We have distributed more than 400 stationeries and note books plus much-needed cash to the orphan-victims of America's Agent Orange in Ho Chi Minh City, HE Luding Khenchen's niece's studies, Tiktsa Rinpoche's monastery in Tibet, the hundreds of oil, lamps and incense before the holy Bodhi tree and so many more we cannot remember !!
We have of course so many other projects in need of your support. To help us: http://www.casotac.
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6 -You Got To Know This !! ____________ 7 - For Friends of CAS ONE Tiktsa Rinpoche's monastery in Tibet needs a water storage tank. To help, please contact Dennis at denpoh1@hotmail. TWO Teaching by the great realised Master, Nupa Rinpoche. For details, contact Drikung Thubten Dargye Ling:
FOUR For a par excellent slides from Stone-Peace on what makes a Buddhist, please email bb at contact@casotac.
____________ tELL A fRIEND "KNOW DHARMA; SHARE DHARMA !!" Be part of our thousand++ "Friends @ CAS" ( that belongs to Chenrezig & other holy beings ) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx "I wanna number my days in samsara. sUBSCRIBE mE NOW !!" Email contact@casotac. ____________ ____________ See www.casotac. CASonline - Your Buddhist online news and teachings. ( All online articles lovingly archived at http://www.casotac. | |||
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