Book 294: Samsara Affections: A Bodhisattva’s Enlightenment

Author：Sheng-Yen Lu

Publisher：True Buddha Prajna Treasury

Publication Date：2023/05/15

Language：Traditional Chinese

Suitable for ages ：All

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Summary：

Living Buddha Lian-sheng Sheng-Yen Lu Book 294, Samsara Affections

Preface
Firstly:
I returned to Taiwan on November 20, 2022. While going through my study, I found a box with letters in it from female disciples. This discovery motivated me to write this book.

One of the motivations:
At first, I wanted to burn these letters. But after reading them, I couldn’t bring myself to do this because these letters were about “emotions.” Can emotions be burned to ashes by fire? After all, this saha world is a realm of sentient beings, and I am one too. If not for emotions, would I have been born into the saha world? Without emotion, how can I save sentient beings? Isn’t a bodhisattva awakened by emotions?

The second motivation:
The key to Vajrayana is the word “transformation.”

1. Use precepts, concentration, and wisdom to transform greed, hatred, and ignorance.
   
2. Use enlightenment to transform confusion.
   
3. Use subtle consciousness to transform coarse and heavy consciousness.
   
4. Use giving to transform money and wealth.
   
5. Use light to transform black karma.
   
6. Use qi, channels, and light drops, transforming them into great bliss, light, and emptiness.
   
7. Use meditation and wisdom to transform passion. (Highest Yoga Tantra)

I say:
One can also transform emotions accumulated over many lifetimes into a bodhisattva’s retinue.
I have learned:
The yoga of qi.
The yoga of inner fire.
The yoga of light drops.
The yoga of the Four Blisses.
(Initial Bliss, Supreme Bliss, Most Supreme Bliss, and Innate Bliss)
I cultivate physical non-leakage and mental non-leakage.

I can honestly tell everyone:
As long as there is emptiness.
As long as there is non-leakage.
As long as there is Bodhicitta.
Passion can be transformed.

The third motivation:
I understand that feelings between people come from:
Gazing.
Smiling.
Holding hands.
Embracing.
(And the karma of successive lifetimes, which no one can escape or avoid.)
The point is to write about these passions!
And “transform” them.
This book is not only about passion, but emotion also. I want to transform passions with Buddhadharma.
This way, it will all be more meaningful.
(To avoid everyone guessing who is who, the names of female disciples have been hidden.)

May this book enrich your mind.

Contact Sheng-Yen Lu
17102 NE 40th Ct.,
Redmond WA 98052
U.S.A.
Dec. 2022

Translated by TBTTs
Translator: DJ Chang
Editor: Henry Wolf