Expert: Laurie McLauglin - 10/6/2010

Question
Hi. I'm a college student who has been researching Buddhism for a theology course.  My mind is boggled by a couple of concepts.  Maybe you can help.
Question 1: As I understand, it can take numerous lives for a Bodhisattva to reach full enlightenment.  However, people don't remember what they were or did in previous lives.  So, how does the Bodhisattva know that he/she is on this path and pick up where the last life left off?
Question 2: I have read that advanced Bodhisattvas can exist in the celestial realms, where they will continue to help other beings.  However, I have also read that the human realm is the only one where merit can be earned toward one's karma and that all karma, even for those in the celestial realms, runs out.  So, how do these Bodhisattvas continue to advance or, at least, maintain their current status?

Thanks,
Nicole

Answer
Hello Nicole

Thank you for letting me answer your questions.

The reason it has taken me so long to answer your questions is that I was waiting for some of my teachers to get out of a retreat they have been in.

I wanted to get you the best information so I had to wait for them to be available for my questions.

To answer your first question, it is not always true that people don't recall who they were in previous lives. People tend to remember and be drawn to things in a current life that have made a deep imprint from a past life.  It is like a tire track on a road.  The more the tire goes on one part of the road, the deeper the track.

This is why we are supposed to practice so much in the current life. The more we practice meditation for example, the more of an imprint it makes in our mindstream and the more chance that a practitioner will be able to have the same tendencies, skill set, potential, drive, interests and desires from one life to the next.

It is true of most things, the more often you do something, the more familiarity you get with it and the better you get at it.  Many say this is where child prodigies come from; that in a past life they were very skilled at one thing and in their next human rebirth they show the tendencies of that thing - such as geniuses or virtuosos.  So if it can be true for piano prodigies, it follows it would be the same with spiritual practitioners who devote their lives to their spiritual practice.

It took the Buddha a very long time to become a Buddha.  So it does not mean that once a Bodhisattva starts on the path, that every life he will be practicing, but the farther he goes along the path again the more imprints he develops and the more likely that that Bodhisattva will reincarnate and then continue on the path.

Plus the more one delves into and practices their spirituality, more often as not, the more often they develop certain powers such as being able to begin to recall their past lives.

There are even some practitioners who have not progressed far enough along the path as to be a Bodhisattva but who do recall some of their past lives and recall other lives where they were practicing dharma or have some memory of having past lives with their current teachers and gurus.

As for question number 2, there are six realms where a sentient being can be born into; the hell realms the hungry ghost realm, the animal realm, the human realm, the demigod realm and the god realm.

From what I have been taught, it is not just Bodhistattvas that can go to the higher demi god and god realms.

Being born in any of these realms happens because of one's karma.  If one has done a whole lot of positive things and created a whole lot of positive karma then they have created enough positive merit to go to a god realm.

It is true. If one stays in the celestial realms of the god realm or the demi god realm then one does tend to burn off ones merit more quickly than one can make it because in those realms no one is really inspired to do good deeds in order to create more good merit and so ones good merit is burned off and one returns to the lower realms.

The human realm is not the only realm where one can earn merit. I believe one could earn merit in the celestial realms or even in the animal realm, though one would not earn as much merit in these realms as in the human realm.

By your own statement, if they exist in the celestial realms and are helping others in those realms, they are by the fact of helping others collecting merit.

What is true is that, from what I understand is the human realm is the only realm where one can attain enlightenment. This is because as humans we have the mental faculties to do the work to get us to enlightenment and also the suffering in this human realm creates enough motivation for us to practice hard enough to gain enlightenment.

You may be confusing the terms merit and karma. Merit is like the brownie points we accumulate by doing good actions.

Karma means action.  Karma can be positive, negative or neutral and is like the record of our deeds.  If we do a lot of good deeds, we create positive karma and merit. If we do neutral deeds we create neutral karma and if we do negative deeds, we create negative karma.

In order for a Bodhistattva to continue to have enough merit to continue on the path toward enlightenment, they must continue to do as many positive deeds as possible, creating positive karma and as few negative deeds, creating negative karma as possible.  The positive karma allows us to have rebirths where we are born into a situation where we have a the most chances to continue to practice the dharma and continue along our spiritual path.

So, if a Bodhistattva ended up in a god realm, he would stay there until he burned off enough good merit and then he would be reborn again in the human realm. And in the human realm, he can continue to practice and work toward his enlightenment and create more and more positive karma and merit from the good actions the Bodhisattva does.

Once Bodhistattvas get to a certain level then they will never be reborn in any of the three lower realms, animal, hungry ghost or hell realms. So they can only ever be born a god, demi god or human.

I hope these answers help to answer your questions.  If you have any further questions don't hesitate to ask.

Namaste - Laurie