How Karma Works: The Twelve Links of Dependent-Arising

Description

A commentary by Geshe Sonam Rinchen on this important teaching, based on the Rice Seedling Sutra and the twenty-sixth chapter of Nagarjuna's "Treatise on the Middle Way". We all want to find happiness and be free of suffering. Happiness comes from positive mental states and actions and suffering from the opposite. The twelve part process of dependent arising shows how actions underlain by ignorance propel us from one rebirth into another, keeping us trapped in suffering, and how through understanding reality correctly we can break this cycle. The twelve links that make up this chain of causes and effects are an extension of the four noble truths, the heart of the Buddha's teaching, and demonstrate in particular the connection between true suffering and true sources of suffering.

Geshe Sonam Rinchen (1933-2013) studied at Sera Je Monastery and in 1980 received the Lharampa Geshe degree. He taught Buddhist philosophy and practice at the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in Dharamsala, India, as well as in dharma centers around the world.

"Ruth Sonam's clear translations . . . offer easily accessible commentaries on the teachings suitable for practitioners at all levels." -The Middle Way