My Teacher, Lama Jigme Gyatso

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My name is Patricia Snodgrass. I am a writer. I went to college to learn my trade, earned a degree and scampered off to do what I do best, write. And even though I have been writing for quite some time now, no editor has ever grabbed me by my lapels and shouted in my face, how dare you call yourself a writer? Where did you go to college, how long did you stay there? What is your degree in? Was your college accredited? I want to know who your teachers were, and their teachers before them, and if you cannot or will not provide me with this information I will denounce you on the internet as a fraud and as a liar!

Fortunately my editors are much more civilized than that. Of course I can tell them I have a degree (its in my curriculum vitae should they ask for it, but thus far, no one has) but they as well as myself know, that it’s not the sheepskin that’s hanging on my office wall that qualifies me to write. It’s the quality of writing I produce.

So I have witnessed via my adventures in dharma that those self righteous Buddhists who come before a teacher, and thus, grab him or her by their robes, red faced, neck muscles tense fit to burst, demanding to know who said teacher is, what monastery did they do their retreat with, who was their teacher, their teacher’s teacher, and so forth. And if they do not get the desired response, they run off into web forum land, which are nothing more than online vomitoriums, and spew their hatred of said lama for the entire world to see.

Now. The truth of the matter is, is that these people do not give a hoot in hell about the teacher’s qualifications, and even if said teacher were to produce them they’d only find something else to complain about.

What they care about is

1. making themselves look good in their own deluded way by ‘truth crusading.’
2. giving their ego free reign to demolish the reputation of someone whom they’ve probably never met in real life.
3. obscured by their arrogance which limits what they comprehend.

So, does it matter if a teacher is qualified to teach? Of course it does. But if anyone has ever gone to a doctor and gotten bad advice knows that even the most qualified person isn’t necessarily the best person for treating illness. Some physicians are downright awful, no matter what Ivy League college they attended. Been there, experienced that. I’m sure you have too, or at least heard of someone who has.

If credentials, lineage, and so forth don’t really matter in choosing a qualified teacher then what does?

The Buddha explored this very topic as inferred by the Sutra of the Kalama’s Dilemma.

The only thing that truly qualifies a teacher, is whether or not his instructions work when his students apply them consistently.

When you come before a teacher, no matter how well documented he or she is, and you cannot understand that person, or if their teachings don’t work, then he or she is not the teacher for you.

If, however, you come before a teacher who says, let’s not worry about trivial things such as lineage and certification; let’s focus instead upon dharma practice. And you listen to this person and, apply the teachings and you find yourself experiencing greater freedom from the puppet strings of sorrow, anger and anxiety while also soaring to new heights of joy, love and peace, then cherish that teacher as the Aladdin’s lamp of good fortune that he or she is.

Until next we speak.

Om mani padme hum

~Patricia Snodgrass

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