Lama Zopa Rinpoche

obscurations but also the obscurations to knowledge, the subtle obscurations, and so
completed all the realizations and achieved buddhahood in that very brief lifetime of these
degenerate times. Even though he had created so much negative karma in his early life, in
later life he became enlightened.
Marpa had wanted to make Milarepa bear even more hardships before he gave him teachings
so that he would become enlightened even more quickly, but his wisdom mother intervened
so he gave the teachings earlier than he wanted to. But still, he made Milarepa build the
tower three times. That was extremely harsh.
In the West, if the guru were to speak harshly or use ugly words or do something like strike
the disciple, the very next day the disciple would put him into prison. Here, it wasn’t like
that. Milarepa was able to achieve enlightenment in a brief lifetime of degenerate times
because of the incredible, unbelievable purification from Marpa, particularly accepting every
scolding and having to build the tower three times.
There is another story that illustrates the guru-disciple relationship. Losang Dhargye Gyatso
was a direct disciple of the Sixth Panchen Lama, Losang Palden Yeshe, and Arik Geshe
Jampa Özer. 42 He was very learned and gave a commentary to Lama Tsongkhapa’s
important teaching, Drang-nge-legshe-nyingpo, The Heart of the Good Explanation of the Interpretive
and Definitive Meaning. 43 During the commentary he mentioned this story about how the geshe
Chenpo Sumra Mitupa had pleased the Seventh Dalai Lama, Kelsang Gyatso. I think
Chenpo Sumra Mitupa is a nickname meaning “one who doesn’t have a shortsighted mind.”
The Seventh Dalai Lama was so pleased with this geshe for not having a shortsighted mind.
In the presence of the Victorious Omniscient One, the Seventh Dalai Lama, this geshe asked
him to predict his next rebirth. The Seventh Dalai Lama told him that immediately he died
he would be reborn as an ox with blue horns. When Geshe Chenpo Sumra Mitupa heard
this he laughed and laughed and laughed. The Seventh Dalai Lama asked him why he had
laughed like that and he replied, “O lekso.” That’s a debating term used when the debater is
asking for reasons, meaning “it’s not easy to believe.” He then went on, “Our path is a path
of the reasoning. Even if I were to be reborn as an ox in the next life, first I would have to
go through the intermediate stage; then the father and mother ox would have to meet and I
would enter into the womb. Then gradually my body would develop and hairs would come
out. Then, after all that, I would get horns. You told me I would be reborn as an ox with
blue horns ‘immediately I died’ without any time to do all this—the bardo, the male and
female ox meeting, and then developing in the womb. So I was laughing at the absurdity of
it. Without time to go through all these processes, to just immediately be born as an ox with
blue horns—I was laughing at this.”
When he heard this, the Victorious Omniscient One, the Seventh Dalai Lama, also laughed
and laughed. He then said, “Now in your next life you will be born as a bhikshu and you will
be in my entourage.”
Then Geshe Chenpo Sumra Mitupa replied, “Maybe I’m thick-skulled, but this seems
unknown and doesn’t fit into our path of reasoning. You said before that I will be born as an
ox but now you say I will be born a bhikshu. And yet I haven’t done any confession, any
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