1a) For individual beings who take refuge

For individual beings who take refuge, there is the teaching of the individual kinds of foundation of their paths.

Taking refuge is the ground of every path.
Lesser people do so fearing the lower realms.
The two intermediate kinds are afraid of the state of samsara.
The greatest have seen all the aspects of samsaric suffering.
Finding others’ suffering to be unbearable,
They fear the happiness of a personal nirvana.

For entering on the great vehicle of the buddha-sons,
There are three ways of taking refuge with three kinds of intention.
These are the unsurpassed, the excellent, and the common.

If we do not take refuge, the vow will not arise. If we do not bind ourselves with the vow, there is no path. Therefore, refuge is the foundation of the path. The Seventy Verses on Refuge (skyabs ’gro bdun cu) says:

Even if we have taken all the vows,
If we have not gone to refuge, they have no power.

Beings are of three kinds. The lesser, desiring the fruition of samsaric happiness, are afraid of the lower realms.

When such persons take refuge with their particular gods or with the three jewels, they do not enter into the doctrine.  Even if they do enter, they are outsiders, not Buddhists. Even if they are included among Buddhists and have faith in the three jewels, they are not able to enter the path. The Sutra of the Ultimate Victory Banner (mdo rgyal mtshan dam pa) says:

As for persons terrified by fear,
For the most part they have taken refuge
In mountains or forests, or in temples and stupas.
Or they have taken trees as their objects of refuge.^[1]
These are not the principal refuges.
These are not the excellent refuges.
With the foundation of such refuges,
They will not be fully liberated.

It is taught that they find their path in external gods, in their desire for happiness. The Vinaya Scriptures say:

Ananda asked, “Is it explained by the approach of a bhramin’s daughter taking refuge in the virtues of the celestial realms?”

Then the Bhagavan spoke.  “Ananda, that is not it.  Such aspiration to samsaric happiness is known as the refuge of ordinary persons. Therefore, profess the true qualities of liberation.

This passage also explains the lesser sort of refuge in the three jewels, which has impure motivation. As for the middle kind, those of the families of shravakas and pratyekabuddhas, afraid of samsara, go to refuge because they seek nirvana as a personal benefit. The former text says:

Whoever, at any time, should go to refuge
In the Buddha, Dharma, and the Sangha
Is a possessor of the four noble truths:
Suffering, and the cause of suffering,

Truly passing beyond all suffering,
And the noble path, with its eight branches,
That leads to the condition of nirvana.
If they produce the divine eye of true prajña,

Those will be their principal refuges.
They are refuges that are excellent.
Relying upon those very refuges
Completely liberates from suffering.

As for the greater kind, having become afraid of peace and happiness, they go to refuge for the benefit of others. The Great Liberation (thar pa chen po) says:

Some become afraid of personal peace and completely abandon it for the sake of those who have fallen into the river of samsara. Such refuge is known as that of excellent beings, the holy guides.

These three kinds of persons are distinguished on the basis of three kinds of mind. The Lamp of the Path of Enlightenment (Bodhipathapradipa, byang chub lam kyi sgron ma) says:

In terms of there being lesser, middle, and great,
It should be known that there are three kinds of beings.
The divisions of these will now be written down,
Fully explaining their different characteristics.

Those who by whatever means are used,
Try to accomplish, for their own benefit,
Merely samsaric kinds of happiness
Are the ones that are known as being lesser.

Those who turn their backs on samsaric pleasures,
Trying to stop the karma of evil actions,
And to gain the merely personal peace of nirvana,
Are known as beings of the middle kind.

Because of the pain they apprehend in themselves
Those who have a strong wish to terminate,
All the suffering of other beings
Are the persons designated as excellent.

Lesser ones, by practicing external cleanliness, non-injury, and Dharma go to the celestial realms; or having gone to refuge with the inner three jewels, by their minimal merits they cross to the celestial realms. Both of those need to act in accord with the meritorious ten virtues and practice formless samadhi. Otherwise they will not cross to the celestial realms. Some, but not all, the samkhyas have such a Dharma. The middle ones are the shravakas and pratyekabuddhas, The greater are those who are renunciates of the Mahayana path.