You can plant good roots or bad roots. If you do not believe in and make offerings to the Triple Jewel, your bad roots increase. When you withdraw from the Triple Jewel, your good roots decrease. When you are near the Triple Jewel your good roots increase. Take heed. Do not do bad deeds. Offer up only good conduct.

The inhabitants of Uttarakuru cannot see the Buddha, hear the Dharma, or see the Sangha, and so their good roots die. In order to plant good roots one should first take refuge with the Triple Jewel. To plant further good roots one can receive the five precepts, the eight precepts, or the ten major and forty-eight minor precepts of a Bodhisattva available for laymen; or the 250 bhikṣu or 348 bhikṣunī precepts available for those who wish to leave the home life.

The good roots one plants by accepting and holding the five precepts and cultivating the ten good acts cannot be seen, smelled, tasted, or touched because they are without a mark. “All with marks is empty and false,” but people do not realize that, and only know how to nurture their bodies, not their good roots.

“What are good roots?”

Good roots are another name for your dharma body and your wisdom. Good roots are the firm foundation which comes from cultivation. A good foundation causes your dharma body to manifest, your wisdom to increase, and your originally existent real mark prajña to function.

It Is essential, however, that you plant good roots before the Triple Jewel in order to reap the fruit of Bodhi. If you plant good roots with non-Buddhist religions, you will not be able to reap any ultimate benefit, no matter how many good roots you plant or how long you nurture them.