Dalai Lama Foundation Study Circle Montreal

Dalai Lama Quote of the Week

Nature’s law dictates that, in order to survive, bees must work together. As a result, they instinctively possess a sense of social responsibility. They have no constitution, no law, no police, no religion or moral training, but because of their nature, they labor faithfully together. Occasionally, they may fight, but in general, based on cooperation, the whole colony survives.

We human beings have a constitution, laws and a police force. We have religion, remarkable intelligence and a heart with a great capacity for love. We have many extraordinary qualities, but in actual practice, I think we are lagging behind those small insects. In some respects I feel we are poorer than the bees.

–from The Pocket Dalai Lama by the Dalai Lama, compiled and edited by Mary Craig

Dharma Quote of the Week

Nagarjuna offers us encouragement in terms of someone of modest potential accomplishing the practice, in verse 116:

And even those who realized the truth
Did not fall from the heavens, nor emerge
Like crops of corn from earth’s dark depths, but once
Were ruled by kleshas and were ordinary men.

Not one of all the sublime beings who have appeared–individuals who had direct realization of the Dharma of the four truths–was already a sublime being right from the beginning: they did not fall from the sky, nor did they emerge from the darkness of the earth like a crop. In the past they were subject to afflictive emotions [‘kleshas’]–they were ordinary people dominated by the afflictive emotions. They are therefore worth following as an example for accomplishing the path.(p.150)

–from Nagarjuna’s Letter to a Friend: with Commentary by Kangyur Rinpoche by Nagarjuna, with commentary by Longchen Yeshe Dorje, Kyabje Kangyur Rinpoche, translated by The Padmakara Translation Group, published by Snow Lion Publications

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