The Rice Seedling Sutra

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The Rice Seedling Sutra: Buddha's Teachings on Dependent Arising

Book

Translations of Sutras (Tib-Eng)

• A Buddha Within: The Tathāgatagarbhasūtra
• Ascertaining the Vinaya: Upāli's Questions: Vinayaviniścayopāliparipṛcchā (Erdene-Ochir, B.)
• Bodhisatvapiṭaka (Bibliotheca Polyglotta)
• Creatures: Saṅgharakṣita and the Shape-Shifting Nāga
• Describing the Benefits of Producing Representations of the Thus-Gone One: Tathāgatapratibimbapratiṣṭhānuśaṃsasaṃvarṇana (Teleki, K.)
• Inspiring Determination: Adhyāśayasaṃcodana (Dorje, Lama Sherab)
• Marici-Dharani
• Teaching How All Phenomena Are without Origin: Sarvadharmāpravṛttinirdeśa (Hinkle, T.)
• The Absorption of the Miraculous Ascertainment of Peace: Praśāntaviniścayaprātihāryasamādhi (Hinkle, T.)
• The Application of Mindfulness of the Sacred Dharma: Saddharmasmṛtyupasthāna (Doctor, T.)
• The Array of Virtues of Mañjuśrī's Buddha Realm: Mañjuśrībuddhakṣetraguṇavyūha (Hinkle, T.)
• The Avalokinī Sūtra: Avalokinīsūtra (Collet-Cassart, B.)
• The Bodhisattva Path: Based on the Ugraparipṛcchā, a Mahāyāna Sūtra
• The Detailed Account of the Previous Aspirations of the Blessed Bhaiṣajyaguruvaiḍūryaprabha: Bhagavānbhaiṣajyaguruvaiḍūryaprabhasya pūrvapraṇidhānaviśeṣavistāra (Krug, A.)
• The Dhāraṇī of the Jewel Torch: Ratnolkādhāraṇī (Jackson, D.)
• The Diamond Sutra (Conze)
• The Exalted Mahāyāna Sūtra on the Wisdom Gone Beyond Called The Vajra Cutter
• The Fortunate Aeon: How the Thousand Buddhas Become Enlightened
• The Good Eon: Bhadrakalpika (Doctor, T.)
• The Holy Teaching of Vimalakīrti
• The Jewel Cloud: Ratnamegha (Doctor, T.)
• The King of Glorious Sutras called the Exalted Sublime Golden Light
• The King of Samādhis Sūtra: Samādhirājasūtra (Roberts, P.)
• The Legend of Saṃgharakṣita
• The Lion's Roar of Queen Śrīmālā
• The Miraculous Play of Mañjuśrī: Mañjuśrīvikrīḍita (Braarvig, J.)
• The Origins and Early History of the Mahāratnakūṭa Tradition of Mahāyāna Buddhism with a Study of the Ratnarāśisūtra and Related Materials
• The Play in Full: Lalitavistara (Doctor, A.)
• The Precious Discourse on the Blessed One’s Extensive Wisdom That Leads to Infinite Certainty: Niṣṭhāgatabhagavajjñānavaipulyasūtraratnānanta (Doctor, A.)
• The Questions of Rāṣṭrapāla (1): Rāṣṭrapālaparipṛcchā (Brockhausen, K.)
• The Questions of Sāgaramati: Sāgaramatiparipṛcchā (Hinkle, T.)
• The Questions of the Nāga King Sāgara (1): Sāgaranāgarājaparipṛcchā (Hinkle, T.)
• The Questions of the Nāga King Sāgara (2): Sāgaranāgarājaparipṛcchā (Ewing, B.)
• The Questions of the Nāga King Sāgara (3): Sāgaranāgarājaparipṛcchā (Gyaltsen, Kalsang)
• The Range of the Bodhisattva: A Study of an Early Mahāyānasūtra - Āryasatyakaparivarta
• The Rice Seedling Sutra
• The Rice Seedling: Śālistamba (Raktrul, 6th)
• The Seal of Engagement in Awakening the Power of Faith: Śraddhābalādhānāvatāramudrā (Beer, Z.)
• The Skill in Means (Upāyakauśalya) Sūtra
• The Sky as a Mahāyāna Symbol of Emptiness and Generous Fullness: A Study and Translation of the Gaganagañjaparipṛcchā: Volume 1: Introduction
• The Sky as a Mahāyāna Symbol of Emptiness and Generous Fullness: A Study and Translation of the Gaganagañjaparipṛcchā: Volume 2: Edition and Translation
• The Stem Array: Gaṇḍavyūha (Roberts, P.)
• The Strength of the Elephant: Hastikakṣya (Forgues, G.)
• The Sutra of the Householder Uncouth
• The Ten Bhūmis: Daśabhūmika (Roberts, P.)
• The Ugraparipṛcchā, the Mahāratnakūṭasūtra and Early Mahāyāna Buddhism
• The Vajradhvajapariṇāmanā: An Edition and Translation of the Tibetan Version
• The Voice of the Buddha
• The White Lotus of the Good Dharma: Saddharmapuṇḍarīka (Roberts, P.)
• The Ākāśagarbha Sūtra: Ākāśagarbhasūtra (Tenzin, Jampa, et al)
• The Śālistamba Sūtra
• The Śālistamba Sūtra and Its Indian Commentaries, Volume I
• Vagrakkhedikâ, The Diamond-Cutter
• Śāntideva and the Mādhyamika: The Prajñāpāramitā-Pariccheda of the Bodhicaryāvatāra

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Descriptionངོ་སྤྲོད།

In the Rice Seedling Sutra, the Buddha unpacks the law of cause and effect. He notes how in the natural world, a seed becomes a sprout, which produces a flower, which bears fruit. A seed has no intention to sprout; when the right conditions are assembled the fruit arises. Similarly, when our senses encounter an object, a sense consciousness arises naturally, without our intending it. This, says the Buddha, is also how karma works and how actions performed out of ignorance create suffering, whether we want it or not. And this same law of causality also governs enlightenment—when the right conditions are assembled, awakening is assured.

In many sutras like this one, the Buddha explains that to understand his Dharma is to understand dependent arising. Geshe Yeshe Thabkhe explores dependent arising, and the corollary teaching of emptiness, through this sutra and others. Commenting on the works of Indian masters such as Śāntarakṣita, he shows how belief in a creator god is incompatible with dependent arising, and by illuminating the teachings of Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti, he shows how we do—and do not—exist. (Source: Wisdom Publications)

Citation

Thabkhe, Geshe Yeshe. The Rice Seedling Sutra: Buddha's Teachings on Dependent Arising. Translated by Joshua and Diana Cutler. Somerville, MA: Wisdom Publications, 2020.

Publisher Link

https://wisdomexperience.org/product/rice-seedling-sutra/

Table of contents

• Prefacevii
• The Rice Seedling: A Mahayana Sutra1
• Translated by Jeffrey D. Schoening

• • 1. How to Seek Reality by Means of Buddha’s Teaching on Dependent Arising13
  • 2. Analysis of the Divine Creator33
  • 3. Is Dependently Arisen Production Actual Production?55
  • 4. How Phenomena Exist73
  • 5. Thee Trainings of the Tree Types of Persons87
  • 6. Escaping the Wheel of Life91
  • 7. The Factors of Dependent Arising113
  • 8. How the Self Exists127

• Notes145
• Bibliography153
• Index157
• About the Author161

Interconnections

Works related to this item

1 Full translation of

Śālistambasūtra [आर्यशालिस्तम्बनाममहायानसूत्र]. 'phags pa sA lu'i ljang pa zhes bya ba theg pa chen po'i mdo [འཕགས་པ་སཱ་ལུའི་ལྗང་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ།]. [The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra "The Rice Seedling" (84000)]. Translated by Amoghavajra, Chih-ch'ien, Dānapāla. Kangyur, RKTSK 210 http://www.rkts.org/cat.php?id=210&typ=1.འཕགས་པ་སཱ་ལུའི་ལྗང་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ།

Classical WorksAbout this item

In this sūtra, at the request of venerable Śāriputra, the bodhisattva mahāsattva Maitreya elucidates a very brief teaching on dependent arising that the Buddha had given earlier that day while gazing at a rice seedling. The text discusses outer and inner causation and its conditions, describes in detail the twelvefold cycle by which inner dependent arising gives rise to successive lives, and explains how understanding the very nature of that process can lead to freedom from it. (Source: 84000)

Bīja - A seed, commonly used figuratively in the sense of something which has the potential to develop or grow, and likewise as the basic cause for this development or growth. Skt बीज  Tib ས་བོན་  Ch 無漏種  

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Avidyā - Literally "unknowing," it refers to a lack of knowledge or misunderstanding of the nature of reality. As such, it is considered to be the root cause of suffering and the basis for the arising of all other negative mental factors. Skt अविद्या  Tib མ་རིག་པ་  Ch 無明  

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Śūnyatā - The state of being empty of an innate nature due to a lack of independently existing characteristics. Skt शून्यता  Tib སྟོང་པ་ཉིད་  Ch 空;空門  

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Sūtra - Sūtras mainly refer to the discourses delivered by the Buddha and his disciples, and the Sūtra corpus is one of the three main sets of teachings which form the Buddhist canon. Skt सूत्र  Tib མདོ།  Ch 佛经  

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Bodhisattva - A person who seeks enlightenment for the sake of others. In Mahāyāna Buddhism, a bodhisattva is a compassionate being who is training on the path to buddhahood and aspires to eliminate the suffering of all beings and take all sentient beings to the state of enlightenment. The Mahāyāna sūtras including those on buddha-nature generally have bodhisattvas as the main audience or interlocutors for the Buddha's discourses. Skt बोधिसत्त्व  Tib བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའ།  Ch 菩薩  

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