Archive Result

1

GUIDE TO THE BODHISATTVA’S WAY OF LIFE CHAPTER 9: WISDOM

Oral explanations by Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche

20050118GRAABWL

20050118GRAABODHI9 (PART I)

Thank you and welcome to this first session in the new year. Everything is new, fresh and great. I am very happy to see you all looking great, our usual good old people, as well as a number of new faces. You are welcome here.

This is now the 9th chapter of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara, the 'Bodhisattva's Way of Life'. We spent all of last year on the 8th chapter, the meditation chapter. Without the base of the 8th chapter there is no way we can establish the 9th chapter.

What is meditation? How do we meditate? What are the stages you reach? Is the meditation right or wrong? What are the measurements? What are the 9 stages? What are the 6 powers you apply? What are the 4 conjunctions you apply? If you read your transcripts from last year together you will find all of that. These transcripts have been available on the Jewel Heart website. If you only read one session and don't have the whole picture it doesn't make any sense. When you put them together it makes a lot of sense. This is the 5th paramita, or perfection of the Bodhisattva's way.

The 6th paramita is wisdom. It is built on the 5th. Without the 5th, the 6th doesn't work. Wisdom is most important. The first verse in this 9th chapter says

Buddha has given all other branches and activities to us in order to develop wisdom.

All the previous eight chapters have been shared so that we can develop wisdom.

Chandrakirti, the great Indian teacher, who is Nagarjuna's main commentator, and who wrote the root text on the Middle Path, which has the theory or - I hate to say "doctrine" on wisdom, says,

There is a townful of blind people. If they don't have someone who can guide them, they will never be able to reach to the City of Liberation. Forget about reaching the City of Liberation, they may not even be able to enter the path that leads there. If there is no wisdom the other five paramitas, generosity, morality, enthusiasm and concentration don't really work. They are like blind people without guide. There is no way they could reach to the goal of buddhahood.

Therefore wisdom is so important. I intend to devote a total year's work to this. With this I mean the Tuesdays and Thursdays, not the retreats. We will work with wisdom by using Shantideva's bodhisattvacharyatara on Tuesdays in Ann Arbor and for the Thursdays in New York either Tsong Khapa's long lam rim, the lam rim chen mo, or his Medium lam rim. The lam rim chen mo is huge. So I am not sure. Even if I do use it I may have to highlight it and jump around.

Unfortunately the Thursday evening teachings cannot be broadcasted live due to technical difficulties, but the Tuesday teachings will be on the internet live and the Thursdays will at least be recorded and then put on the internet by Fri night or Saturday. The transcripts of both days will also be made available on the internet. If you study them side by side, like we did last year, there will be some help. However, do expect to have difficulties. Wisdom is extremely tough. We will try to bite what we can chew. However, do expect it is going to be tough. That means a lot of efforts from you, really to get it and try to understand.

Understanding alone is not our goal. Whatever you understand you have to meditate on and practice. That will make a difference to your life. But in order to be able to do that first you have to understand. You have to meditate, particularly on wisdom. Wisdom is very tough. If you are still interested to make your life worthwhile, be prepared to face the challenge. I really wanted to tell you this. It is not like a usual lam rim teaching or a teaching on the Three Principles. Well, the Third Principle is wisdom, but this here is not as easy. It is very complicated and difficult. But when you make it through you will realize what effect that has on you, particularly the wisdom.

Wisdom here will be discriminating wisdom. Every knowledge is wisdom. Knowing something new brings wisdom in us. But here we are talking about a very specific wisdom, being able to discriminate, to clear misunderstanding, wrong understanding and wrong knowing. This is very important for us. We do have a lot of confusion. That is very usual for us. It comes in a variety of ways. First we have very big confusion about every spiritual point of what we think about. Look back in your background.

The first and foremost subject is guru devotion. There is tremendous confusion and misunderstanding. Then, embracing human life. There is tremendous confusion and misunderstanding. Thirdly, impermanence. We have again confusion and misunderstanding. Also, when you look at impermanence, there is gross and subtle impermanence. We might have a good understanding of the level of gross impermanence, but very little of subtle impermanence. We have tremendous ignorance about karma. We look at karma as something almost solid, where you can't do anything, where you can't change things. It is like some overwhelming monster power. That is a big misunderstanding. Karmic confusion is something very funny. Everybody gets into a big confusion.

Very recently that has been happening with the tsunami in South East Asia. The question a number of people asked is: Why? What happened? What went wrong?

I am sure you all heard that. I had calls from a number of different journalists, including our Ann Arbor Observer reporter. Also from the Toledo reporter. The question I got from several people was: How could the good Lord let this happen? My answer to this is:

This is exactly what Buddha talked about: this is the Truth of Suffering. This is the First Noble Truth. Really, ladies and gentlemen, this is the First Noble Truth. If that is not the First Noble Truth, then where is it? It is nobody's fault. It is not the fault of the good Lord. It is not the fault of Buddha. It is not the fault of the Bodhisattvas, of the people who lost their lives, or their loved ones. It is their karma. It is our karma. This is collective karma of the people in the world today. Those who lost their lives, and their loved ones, they do have karma. And so do we all. Somehow their karma happens to be connected to losing their lives. They happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. That's what it is, no question. Why? Because it is karma, however, karma is dependently arising. Karma depends on conditions. When the conditions are right, things happen. When they are not right, no matter whatever you do, it will not happen. Everything is karma, no doubt about it. Everything is dependent arising, no doubt about it. We are looking for wisdom. The real essence of wisdom, the real meaning of emptiness is interdependence. If the real meaning of emptiness is empty then there is no emptiness - because it is empty. Are you with me?

Wisdom is knowing dependent existence, knowing that nothing exists independently. Things trigger each other. One pushes the other and things happen. It is common knowledge, common sense. It is scientific knowledge. Buddhist wisdom knowledge will tell you that. The scientists, when they see something, the first question they raise is: Why? They try to find out and they will find something and say that it is because of this and that. Right or wrong, doesn't matter. But they do find something. That is because it is dependently arising. When the terms and conditions are right, it happens. The tsunami happened. Some preacher told me, "God didn't like what we are doing. It is his punishment." Some of the journalists asked me if I agreed. I said, "No, I do not." Just don't blame poor God. He or she is doing her own business. Don't blame them. The conditions for the tsunami were right, that's why it happened. We have misused our elements. We misuse the earth element. How much pollution do we create? How many toxic things have we dumped into the earth? Sure, we say we can guarantee that it won't leak for 999 years. But whatever it may be, we bury these things in the earth. How many pollutants do we throw into the water? How many atomic bombs have we tested? We in the United States, the Russians, the Chinese, the Indians, the Pakistanis, almost everybody did it, except for those who cannot afford to do it. This is the misuse. How many bombs do we throw? Right there in Iraq, how many did we throw, before we went in, before we did the cleansing of the cities? How many did we indiscriminately throw? Wherever on earth you throw them, it is the one earth, my dear friends! Whether it is in the east, west, south or west, it is one earth. It is like getting hit on the left cheek, right cheek, the chest, the butt, the stomach - you are hitting the earth.

After so much abuse the earth cannot take it - it shakes. That is what we call earth quake. The earth shifted. Naturally, when there is an earthquake, the water will shake. Isn't that obvious? Yet we are still asking, "Why, why, why?" What do we blame the good old Lord for? It is very clear why. Again, I tell you, this is the beginning. This is the beginning. If we are not careful a lot of different catastrophic things can happen in any part of the world. We got to be careful. Each and every individual can make a difference. Each of you and I make a difference. We all can make a difference. We all can contribute. We can contribute to the destruction too. We make a difference, because we are part of society. The society makes a difference. Society is nothing but the collection of individuals - which you all are. That's why you can make a difference, each and everyone of us. We are in the world that exists interdependently. Today's scientists accept that the movement of a butterfly in China makes a difference to the weather in the United States. If that is true scientifically, then every movement on the earth, every bombardment on the earth, every testing of nuclear weapons makes a difference everywhere.

I cannot separate the strange movements of the weather here from what had happened during the tsunami in South-East Asia. In our western world we like to have things compartmentalized. We will say, "The tsunami happened in South East Asia. It affected 11 countries, Indonesia and Sri Lanka were affected the most. Period." What is happening here in the United States seems to be something else, nothing to do with South East Asia. We think it is just the movements of weather conditions in this country. We tend to look at them as separate.

This is the problem with the western mentality. We do that not only in cases like the tsunami, but with everything, including other traditions, religions, spiritual paths. We compartmentalize them, label them, call them "Buddhism", "Hinduism", "Islam", "Christianity", "Catholicism" and so on and we think, "Ha, the situation is under control. I have put them in the right boxes, labeled them, catalogued them in alphabetical order." Forget it, the situation is not under control. They are not separate. They are not in different compartments. They affect each other. That is why we live in the dependent world.

Dependent existence is the meaning of emptiness, according to Buddha. The essence of emptiness is dependent arising. The essence of dependent arising is emptiness. As long as you separate these two, you have no understanding of what Buddha, etc, are talking about. This is what Tsong Khapa said in his Three Principles of the Path:

NANG WA TEN DREL LU WA ME PA DANG

TONG PA KE LEN TREL WEY GO WA NYI

JI SI SO SOR NANG WA DE SI DU

DA DUNG THUB PEY GONG PA TOK PA ME

Interdependent appearance - infallible.

Emptiness - inexpressible reality.

As long as these two seem separate

Buddha's insight is not understood.

We are supposed to talk about wisdom for the whole year. The essence of the wisdom is this. Empty is not empty. The essence of emptiness is interdependent appearance. True wisdom is that the essence of emptiness is interdependece and the essence of interdependence is emptiness. Therefore we exist interdependently. We very much depend on each other. Separating, compartmentalizing, labeling and so on will neither work on the spiritual path nor in reality. That is what the tsunami is to me, if you ask what has happened there. It is the First Noble Truth because it exists interdependently.

We all think we can function independently very well, but you must realize that nothing can function independently. Everything functions interdependently and is interconnected. In other words, we are all interconnected. Every human being, the environment. The whole world exists because of the four elements, earth, water, fire and air. If just one of them is missing we cannot function. Just like our body, our physical body, to be in life depends on the physical existence of the four elements in our body. The earth element in our body is bones and flesh. The water element is all the liquids in our body, red, yellow and white. The heat, the digestive power is the fire element. The circulation is the air element. If one of them is damaged, we know what trouble we get into. The same thing goes for the earth too. The external and internal existence are very much interconnected. The essence of wisdom is interdependence. That is what it means.

I am looking forward to be talking more with you. Normally, we use the text translated by Stephen Batchelor. I was told that for this chapter he used a more commentary-kind of format. That maybe true. There is also Allan Wallace's translation of the same text. Chapter 9 in that book starts on page 115. There are also several commentaries by His Holiness the Dalai Lama on this 9th chapter and also one called "Meaningful to Behold", which should have something on chapter 9. I recommended in New York last week and I repeat it here: Because this is about wisdom it is always interesting to say a few mantras of Manjushri. The mantra is OM ARAPACANA DHIH and also pray to Manjushri to open our wisdom eye. This doesn't mean to physically open the third eye. Don't try to use the kitchen knife and operate on yourself. But put all these efforts together. This is the biggest challenge for our ego. When you say "Emptiness" you have to understand something. You have to know: empty of what. Then there is also two types of things: one is mistaken identity and correcting that, and the other is an identity which doesn't exist but we label it and one has to realize that there is no such a thing. The true emptiness is realizing that there is nothing. It is not the type that is wrong knowing that needs correcting. Wisdom has also two aspects: wisdom on the self, the being, and the wisdom on phenomena. Lets take the beings. What is emptiness of being? Empty means a lack of something. It is lack of existence. Is it the lack of some wrong existence? If you think that is emptiness that would be zhen tong in Tibetan, which would mean empty of something other than what it is. And then, the other kind of emptiness is rang tong, empty of self. That is self-lessness. We are really looking for the emptiness of self and not for the emptiness of other.

This is not that difficult. But I shouldn't make it sound so easy, which comes across as slightly condescending. After all, there are a great many Tibetan teachers that accept zhen tong as ultimate reality. But I think I take the liberty because Tsong Khapa made that statement himself and it was repeated by Locho Rimpoche when he gave the Three Principles teaching here.

The correction of wrong identity would be for example if I called myself a flower vase. When I realize that I am free of being a flower vase, that doesn't mean anything to me. That is zhen tong. But when I say, "I am free of being myself", that is complicated. So anyway, we have one year to talk about this and we will hopefully gain something out of that. I would like to stop here for tonight.

Thank you

A couple of remarks on the compulsory tsoh:

Tomorrow is the second of the two Heruka's festival days. There are only these two compulsory tsoh days in the year. The first was on Jan 5, 2005 and tomorrow, Jan 19th is the second. As announced, everybody is welcome. In Ann Arbor we are going to use a new lama chopa which is connected with Heruka. There are some copies around. It is very similar to the regular lama chopa, but with certain additions. Most of the additions come from the Vajrayogini self initiation. For those who cannot come for their own reasons, between today and the day after tomorrow any time, they can do the tsoh offering in their own places. That will be fine. If you cannot, then your mantra commitment of either Heruka or Vajrayogini has to be tripled. Instead of saying 100 it will be 300. If currently you are saying 21, then you will be saying three times that. If you only say 7, you will be saying 21. That is the worst of worst scenario.

20050125GRAABODHI9

Now is the time for us to deal with the subject of wisdom. Usually we go on the basis of Stephen Batchelor's translation. I didn't really get a chance to read it. I don't know how he does it in the 9th chapter. But there is another translation by Allan Wallace and Vesna Wallace, which is done from the Sanskrit and the Tibetan. In Allan Wallace's work the first verse of the wisdom chapter says,

Verse 1

The Sage taught this entire system for the sake of wisdom.

Therefore, with the desire to ward off suffering, one should develop wisdom

In the first verse Allan Wallace, instead of saying Buddha, refers to him as 'Sage'. As I said last time, all the different Bodhisattva activities, such as generosity, morality, patience, conscientiousness, enthusiasm, concentration, all the subjects we covered already, even developing bodhimind, the ultimate love/compassion are all taught to develop wisdom. This is what meant here by the entire system being taught for the sake of wisdom. All these branches have been shared by Buddha in order to develop wisdom.

We are talking about wisdom. Whatever practice you have, correcting your motivation, purifying any negativities, accumulating mantras, circumambulations, prostrations or whatever you do, is for developing wisdom. The second half of the verse explains why: with the desire to ward off suffering one should develop wisdom.

Why is wisdom so important? Because it is the actual antidote to suffering. If you have the desire to free yourself from suffering then you have to have wisdom. Wisdom is the one that delivers the goods. Compassion is compassion. It makes you a nice person. It makes you a kind person. It makes you a loving person. But it is not able to deliver the goods. Even bodhimind can't do that.

In the beginning of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara we read about the benefits of the bodhimind, the unlimited, unconditional compassion. Verse 6 of Chapter 1 reads:

Hence virtue is perpetually feeble,

The great strength of immoralityevil being extremely intense,

Aand except for a Fully Awakened Mind

By what other virtue will it be overcome?

For those who don't know what bodhimind is, let me explain. I am not saying "body-mind", but bodhi-mind". It is the mind that seeks the stage of Buddha. People don't say "Buddha tree", but "bodhi tree". They don't say "buddha leaves", but "bodhi leaves". So the bodhimind is the mind that seeks the stage of buddhahood. It is fully committed to bring the Buddha level to ourselves and all beings. I call it: ultimate, unconditional, unlimited love and compassion. Compassion is the desire to remove the suffering, to bring freedom from suffering to oneself and others. Love is the desire to bring ultimate joy and ultimate happiness to oneself and all others. There are no conditions to that. It is not a business mind that thinks, "What is in there for me?" That mind does not care about that. Things need to be done and they are going to be done. Whatever is in there for me is fine. Even if nothing is in it for me it is fine. That is why it is unconditional. If you say, "What's in there for me?" it is conditional. That means it has limitations. It is like saying, "If you pay me this much, I will give you that much." The love and compassion that we are talking about is without conditions. It is so great and so powerful, that both, purification and accumulation of merit are done by it. It looks like it is the only thing that matters.

But from the angle of wisdom, what love and compassion can deliver is limited. This is because they don't destroy the cause, the source of our suffering. Some neutral works neither emphasize wisdom, nor love and compassion. The pramanavartika, the text on logic, for example says,

Love, etc, is not a direct opponent of ignorance. Therefore, they do not destroy ignorance.

That is why Shantideva says in the first verse:

The Sage taught this entire system for the sake of wisdom.

Therefore, with the desire to ward off suffering, one should develop wisdom

This shows why wisdom is so important. If you don't want suffering, advocate wisdom. That is even true in our ordinary life. If you don't want suffering you need to know how to take care of yourself. If you are physically sick, this is true. If you are mentally sick, that is also true. Mental illness is balanced by wisdom, not by love and compassion, certainly not by hatred or obsession. It is only wisdom that can balance it. If you are sick financially - that terminology is never used, by I do today - you also need to apply wisdom in order to bring income in. So even in ordinary situations you need wisdom: wisdom as knowledge, as understanding, as wise way of handling things.

Here, we talk about the very specific wisdom of Buddha, the antidote to all suffering. So this first verse is not so difficult. It simply tells us that we need to develop wisdom.

The traditional Tibetan teachings will try to prove whatever they say with quotes from sutra or tantra. In this commentary more reasons are given why wisdom is the antidote to all suffering. All pains that we have are contaminated. The uncontaminated level does not have any physical, mental or emotional pains at all. Every contaminated thing comes out of karma and delusion. There are karmas that come out of virtue and there are karmas that come out of delusion. I like to call it 'delusion' rather than 'non-virtue'. 'Non-virtue' sounds to me very overpowering and frightening. What is delusion? You don't really see what is happening. We perceive and see slightly not straight. It is a little bit wrong. Why is it a little bit wrong? Because we try to figure out: what is it? And at the end we will say, "Ha, this is it."

We are always looking for the end to the Russian doll. You keep on digging and digging. Once, a friend of mine gave me as a present a doll of President Clinton. It was made in one of the Eastern European countries. When you open that Clinton doll you will find Hillary inside. Inside of that you will find Chelsea and if you open that up you will find Monica Lewinsky and if you open that up you find the saxophone. So the saxophone becomes the end of that Russian doll. You have something there at the end, a solid, little piece of wood that has the picture of a saxophone printed on it. It is something we can point out and see and get.

Nagarjuna says,

If you think that you can find the end of the Russian doll, you will have the continuation of obsession and hatred.

This is because clinging to the end of the Russian doll is the ultimate protection thing we rely on. We try to protect that and we try to protect God and all of that. The question is: Is there really an end to the Russian doll? The word empti-ness tells you that there is no end of the Russian doll. The -ness tells you that while it is empty, it is not nothing. The whole idea of protecting Me, worrying that I will be a failure, protecting ME from suffering, might actually not be true. When I think that I need to protect myself, then anybody that is coming nearby, I will shoot them. That way we create ourselves into the behavior of a porcupine. That is why I like to call that "delusion". What makes us think that is hatred. That is delusion, although all western translators seem to call it "afflictive emotions".

So if you want to get rid of suffering you need wisdom, because all the sufferings come from self-grasping, ego-grasping, or simply ego. There are a lot of different names, but it boils down to holding on to the end of the Russian doll, grasping that. It is true, if you have to think there is nothing at the end of the Russian doll, you will get disenchanted. We are always looking for something to promote, afraid of failure.

Buddha says,

Wisdom recognizes the nature of all existence. Therefore it can take you beyond all existence.

In order to present or talk about wisdom, basically the important thing first is to get the foundation right. I am not going to talk about the foundation of guru-devotional practice and so on. We have done that already. Here I mean the base on which we work. The old style of teaching gives you two outlines:

1. The base of wisdom

2. How to develop that wisdom

Buddha's teaching is 2600 year old wisdom. Sometimes, when you read through a traditional Buddhist text, it doesn't come in the beautifully organized way that we are used to today. Things pop up here and there, different thoughts and ideas. So, some portions will say, "Wisdom is very important and wonderful. You cannot do without it." And then at another point comes a statement, "Let us also say, wisdom alone cannot liberate either. Therefore, you need both, compassion/love, etc, and wisdom." The traditional texts group love/compassion, etc, under the heading of "method". Then wisdom is the pure part. So the teachings say that you need both. You cannot make it if one of them is missing. When we are talking about compassion, the books will say that it is great and wonderful and does everything. When we talk about wisdom, the text will say, "It is only wisdom that can do this." In reality you need both.

Chandrakirti's famous quote says,

The absolute and relative are like the two wings of a bird,

enabling it to cross the ocean and fly wherever it wants to.

The absolute is the wisdom wing and the relative is the compassion wing. You need both. Although we are talking about wisdom, in the middle of that, the author decides to throw that one up again, so that we don't forget it.

Wisdom and compassion in the old Buddhist system is called "path". This is about what you can do, what is practice, what is meditation. These two paths, wisdom and compassion, are also expected to give you their fruits. The ultimate, wonderful body aspect of total enlightenment is traditionally known as rupakaya. That means the form, the body, of total enlightenment. The other aspect is dharmakaya, the mind aspect of total enlightenment. These two results are based on the two paths of compassion and wisdom. In other words, the path of wisdom has as its direct result the enlightened mind and the path of compassion and related activities gives you the physical aspect of enlightenment. The ultimate goal of spiritual practitioners, according to Buddha, is to become enlightened. There are zillions of reasons why that is possible. You have heard about them. I don't want to repeat them now. We could raise the doubting question, "Is this real or is it just hocus pocus?". At the level of our mind, I am not sure if we can answer that. The books and teachings tell us that we can't. That will come in the next verse. I was taught that we have to rely on the answer that is given by the enlightened ones. Buddha said, "Yes, you can become enlightened, because I, the Buddha, managed to get it. Why not you? There is nothing wrong with you."

Buddha says that all the time. He attributes his success to the enthusiasm he has and he blames our failure on our laziness. As a human being, as a wonderful person, with the capacity of a human mind, there is nothing that we cannot achieve. The sky is the limit for what we can do. The mind we have has no limitation, if we can use it.

That does not mean that we are free of confusion. The capacity is there, but we are not completely free of confusion either. Otherwise we should have been Buddha already. We are not. Sometimes we suffer tremendously, because of confusion, because of misunderstanding, or sometimes by going against our own understanding, our own preconceived idea of what it should be. It is the true reality. It is a genuine problem. People do suffer from that. With all that capability and efficiency of our mind we still have all these problems, because we have limitations.

In order to get the two results, rupakaya and dharmakaya, we work on the two paths of compassion and wisdom. Both of these again are based on the two truths.

I always say,

A spiritual path which has no base, no ways and no hope, is useless.

Honestly, it has to be based on truth. It has to have a method that takes you to the result and it has to have a result. Whether a spiritual path is right or wrong, judge from that angle. This is what I was taught. Does it really have a solid base? Does it have a way that takes you to the fruit you are seeking?

The solid base here is again two things: the absolute truth and the relative truth.

Verse 2 of chapter 9 says: The truth is recognized as being of two kinds: conventional and ultimate.

A sutra that I know by heart says,

The one who knows the existence (in other words Buddha), did not buy what others had said. He himself discovered that there are two realities or two truths, the conventional truth and the ultimate truth. There is never a third truth.

You could argue, "Isn't there four noble truths? How can you get four without having a third?" But as you know, that is another set of truths.

Different translators have selected different terms. Allan Wallace uses conventional truth. Stephen Batchelor uses deceptive truth. Others call it relative truth. If my English were as good as my Tibetan I would not have to depend on anybody else. But unfortunately I don't. That is my limitation. There are all kinds of names. It is not enough that we are confused with regard to reality. On top of that we get confused with terminology. Great, thank you!

Let us stick to conventional truth and ultimate truth as our terms. You have to accept that there are two truths, because we function on that basis, although, whether the conventional truth is really true is a different story all together. Let the philosophers worry about that. That is their job. What we have to worry about is our practical level. On that level, if we don't accept two truths we will have a lot of problems. So we have got to accept the two truths. Whether the conventional truth is really truth is a different story. When that thought comes into our head, let us refer that to the philosophers for the time being. If we let our thoughts go, there is no limitation where they can go. It will take you away a lot and you never know what you will discover at the end. But it is going to take all our time. The only problem on the spiritual path is that we don’t have much time. Our time is limited. We are working for ourselves. Although we say “For the benefit of all beings…” what that means is that “for the benefit of all beings I would like to become a Buddha, so that I can serve.” They are not lying, but that’s what it really is. So If I want to become a Buddha, I have to have time to do that. Therefore, wisdom gives you a very important point.

You need discriminating wisdom. That discriminating wisdom should cut out indiscriminate thoughts. We have those a lot. The more intelligent you are, the more brilliant you are, you also get more indiscriminate thoughts, these thoughts that have no discipline. In the scientific field that is wonderful. You can make a lot of discoveries. A lot of the ideas will be failures, but for every hundred failures you only need one good discovery and that will do. That will be good enough to develop a new pain killer pill.

But that does not help us on the spiritual path, because of our time limitation. We therefore need discriminating wisdom, which will give us the edge. The discipline of our wonderful mind will tell us where the boundary is where we have to cut it and what we have to do. When you don’t have that boundary, when the thoughts go open, wild and crazy, you may make a beautiful discovery, but it can also take the individual into an interesting path. These problems are not strange to us. We do lose our boundaries. I don’t want to use the terminology that a lot of psychologists use: the border line personalities going out of their boundaries. I don’t want to use it, but I did use it now! I am sorry, but that’s what it is. This is because there is no discriminating wisdom. Wisdom is supposed to give you that boundary, because of the base of the conventional truth and ultimate truth. Because of these two bases we should know the boundary.

Lets go to the next verse:

Verse 2

This truth is recognized as being of two kinds: conventional and ultimate.

Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect.

The intellect is called conventional reality.

Our mind cannot comprehend ultimate truth. It can only comprehend the conventional truth. Some people try to say that our mind cannot comprehend the ultimate truth because our mind is a conventional truth. That means you have not understood. I don’t know why Allan Wallace uses the term ‘intellect’ for the Tibetan lo. The way it is worded in Tibetan can very easily be interpreted to mean that ultimate truth cannot be known by mind because mind is conventional truth. If someone is telling you that, they don’t know what they are talking about. I would like to leave it here. I don’t want to make it so heavy.

What did we learn today? We picked up that wisdom is extremely important, because it is the key to challenge the causes of all suffering. Suffering comes out of karma, which is created by the delusions. Wisdom can really pinpoint, in other words, can burst, all confusions and lies of life. Therefore, wisdom is important. But wisdom alone cannot deliver the goods. You need the conventional compassion and love, etc. as one wing of the bird. Wisdom is the second wing. A bird needs two wings to fly. Wisdom cannot be understood without getting the idea of base, the foundation on which we work, then what we do as practice and then what we hope to gain. Otherwise wisdom would be useless. It is not a luminous light. If that were the case, we could put up these huge lights like we have in stadiums. But that does not do anything. There has to be a systematic way of working. There has to be the foundation, then the way you work and then the result you hope to get. In traditional Buddhist language we call that: base, path and result. If that is not there, then everything is hala bala. No base, no path, just ha ha ha. That is love and light. Everything is great and wonderful, blab la bla. The teaching is good, the talk is wonderful, lets go home. I am happy, you are happy. That is the end of it and you won’t have a result, beyond the little pleasure of being happy.

The base is the two truths, the path is wisdom and compassion, the result is rupakaya, the physical aspect of enlightenment, and dharmakaya, the mind aspect of enlightenment. If one of them is missing, then you will either become a Buddha without body or a Buddha without mind. That’s why you need two. The base has two, the way has two, the result has two.

Nagarjuna’s dedication says:

Ge wa di yi kye bo kun

So nam ye she so sor shak

So nam ye she le jung wai

Dam pa ku nyi tob par shok

By this virtue,

May all beings develop wisdom merit and merit

And thereby attain the dharmakaya and rupakaya.

It is the common prayer the Tibetans say. Next week I have to talk to you more about the discriminating wisdom and the indiscriminate thoughts.

Let me remind you once again. When you try to develop wisdom, saying migtsemas and om arapacana dhih, working with Manjushri, that helps. Whether it is the mantra aspect or ritual aspect, from that angle it helps. Actually, you really need three things. You need purification, then prayer to the wisdom deity Manjushri and saying the mantras, and you need openness. Try to open yourself completely. Very importantly, try not to be occupied and influenced by free concepts of thoughts. That is what I was taught.

Thank You and Good Night.

20050201GRAABODHI9

Good evening, everybody. As I told you last time, sometimes, when we talk about wisdom, it is going to be very hard. But that’s where we are. We are in the middle of something very hard to [figure out].

It is the second verse of Chapter 9 that we have been looking at:

Verse 2

This truth is recognized as being of two kinds: conventional and ultimate.

Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect.

The intellect is called conventional reality.

This translation refers to the two truths are conventional and ultimate. Stephen Batchelor calls them deceptive and ultimate. Other translations call them relative and absolute.

Conventional reality and conventional truth is talking about the same thing. I could just leave it there and be satisfied with reading that there are these two truths. But you have to get some kind of understanding. In order to get this, just knowing that there are these two words, conventional and ultimate, doesn’t do much good for you. Beyond that, you have to know what is meant by conventional and ultimate truth. Also, what does it mean: Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect? You know, the translators can also twist the words a lot. When he is using the term ‘intellect’ here he is actually referring to mind. Then he says, The intellect is called conventional reality. That looks like it is saying: because mind is conventional reality, therefore it can’t see the ultimate truth. I think some other translator even explains it that way in English too.

The other day I said that this is wrong. So I have to come back here and tell you why that is wrong. Actually, to know these two truths is quite difficult. Why is Buddha called ‘enlightened’? The reason is that at that level you see the conventional and the ultimate both. Sometimes you hear statements that say that we see things alternately. The aryas, the extraordinary people, see the ultimate truth, but while they are seeing the ultimate truth, they cannot see the conventional truth. When you are totally enligthened you will see both of them together. The example given is putting a mirror on the palm of your hand and being able to see the mirror as well as the lines of the palm of your hand, together, simultaneously.

In Buddhism, or in fact anywhere, anything that can be known has fall either under the conventional truth or under the ultimate truth. There is no third way. There are a lot of reasons. I will come back to that later.

What does it mean to say: Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect.?

I think intellect is refering to our mind. Stephen Batchelor does in fact translate it as ‘mind’. The Tibetan text talks about mind. The statement seems to say that the mind cannot know ultimate truth. But probably that is not right. If that is the case we are putting limitations on the mind. And the mind doesn’t have limitations. The scope of the mind is to know anything that is knoweable. You canot put a limit on that.

I think there are two categories of mind. The mind that perceives ultimate reality and the mind that perceives conventional reality are both true. Our ordinary mind cannot perceive ultimate truth. To make it easier to communicate let me say it this way, although that might not absolutely be the meaning of this particular verse: our ordinary mind is a dualistic mind. Therefore it cannot perceive non-dual reality. Therefore, the ‘intellect’ cannot see the ultimate, as this translation says.

That, however, does not mean that the mind is a conventional truth and therefore cannot see ultimate truth. That is really wrong.

You may ask: give me an example of ultimate truth and and an example of conventional truth. That is difficult. You know why? Because the example would be the same. I could take anything. Take this book: it is the example of ultimate truth and it also the example of conventional truth. The normal way of thinking does not work here. That makes it difficult. It is easy to say: the ultimate is the understanding of wisdom and that is emptiness and the conventional is the mind that does not see emptiness. You will say, ‘Yeah, yeah’, but you won’t get it. The thing is that both, ultimate and conventional truth, have to go in one point.

Take this vase. That is a very often used Tibetan and even Sanskrit example. This vase is conventional truth and it is also ultimate truth. The ultimate truth of this vase is no different than the vase itself.

Form is emptiness and emptiness is form.

Form is no other than emptiness,

Emptiness is no other than form.

That is from the Heart Sutra. So the conventional truth is no different from the ultimate truth and the ultimate truth is no different from the conventional truth. However, ultimate truth is not conventional truth and conventional truth is not ultimate truth. But when you give examples, that is how it is. You can use anything as example. Why? The ultimate truth of this vase is the fact that this vase is free of inherent existence. And that is this vase itself. The non-inherently existing vase is no other than this vase itself. If it was something else, than it would become the emptiness of something else. If I find that this glass, for example is the non-inherently existing vase, it would mean that this vase is free of this glass. That is not the emptiness of this vase. It is not self-empty, it would become other-empty. That is no big deal. The hand is free of being the leg. The leg is free of being the hand. The butt is free of the head and the head is free of the butt, which is no big deal! Honestly.

That is why the statement

Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect.

The intellect is called conventional reality.

is the most difficult point to struggle with. It is easy to say that there are two truths. But it is a different matter to go and find out what these two truths are all about. For example, let me apply the two truths to myself. When I look for my truth, I cannot find the conventional truth of me other than myself, nor can I find the ultimate truth other than myself. If I do so, one of them is wrong.

The Tibetan translation of a sutra where Buddha himself refers to this, uses the term jig ten. The English translation of jig ten is most often ‘ordinary’ as opposed to ‘extraordinary’. But the word itself doesn’t mean ordinary. Jig ten almost has the same meaning as jig ta, the ignorance we have been talking about. Jig ta means ‘fear-perceiving’. The reason it is called that is that this is the perception we are born with. Everyone of us is simultaneously born with fear. We are afraid of being lost, we are afraid of some kind of void, that we are going to get hurt, die and disappear. There is something uncertain we are afraid of and which is always there. I am sure that originally, there is a Sanskrit term for that but I don’t know it. In Tibetan it is called jig ten lhen kye, ‘simultaneously-born, fear-based perception’. This perception is there because whenever for example I look at ‘me’, the perception of ‘me’ is based on one or more of my skandhas, either one, two or more or all five of them. They are form, sound, smell, taste and touch, either one or all of them. All of these are by nature impermanent. So they are all going to be destroyed. Therefore, that perception is called ‘fear perception’.

Now, jig ten, ‘ordinary’, really means: ‘one who relies on this impermanent basis’.

Suppose, I ask myself, “Who am I?” I am focusing on something inside me, something based on the body, but more than the body. We are beyond calling our body our ‘self’. A lot of people will just point to their body and say, “That is me”. We know now that the body is not me. But still, there is some body-based ‘me’ inside of me, some kind of consciousness functioning inside the body. We almost feel like we have entered into this body and are doing all kinds of dances. It looks like we are wearing different masks and doing different performances. That means we are depending on the impermanent nature. The reason why we do that is because of the dualistic mind. Normally, dualistic means seeing two different things. Here I am not sure whether we are seeing two different things or not, but we are certainly not seeing one. When we see the one non-dually, it does not really mean we are becoming one with the object. A lot of people think, “When I see the object, I become the object.” That may be true to a certain extent, but I don’t think so. I think that non-dual here means that the act and the actor become inseparable. The object is not necessarily inseparable, maybe, but not necessarily. Mainly it is the act and the actor. Now we definitely see that as separate. We say, “I did it”, or “I did not do it”. We see act and actor as two separate things.

Let me go back to the ultimate. What does that do? At the non-enlightened level, the person who sees the ultimate, can only see that ultimate, but can’t see the conventional. This is the case for the aryas or pak pas, in English ‘special’ or extraordinary, whatever you may call it, in contrast to the jig ten, the ordinary, fear-based perception. The perception of the aryas is not fear-based. It is beyond that. But when the aryas are in the meditative state, they only see the ultimate truth, not the conventional truth. On our level we only see the conventional truth, not the ultimate truth. Then, when you go beyond even the aryas perception, at the totally enlightened level, you will see ultimate and conventional truths together. That is why we have the example of the glass or mirror in the palm of the hand through which you can also see the drawings in the palm of the hand.

Enlightened beings see the ultimate truth of the vase and the relative truth of the vase as inseparable, in one-ness, yet in separate perception. I used to talk to you that love and compassion are one mind with two separate aspects. Love wishes whoever you are thinking about to be happy and joyful. Compassion wishes them to be free from pain, suffering and misery. Similarly, here, we have the same base, but two different aspects. One aspect is the freedom of inherent existence, the other aspect is whatever we perceive.

A lot of people believe that what we perceive is absolutely wrong because it is not the truth. What we just heard tells you that this idea is wrong, because what we perceive we do perceive right. It might not be ultimately right, but it is right. Lets go back to our verse:

Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect.

The intellect is called conventional reality.

The intellect is not called conventional reality. The intellect sees conventional reality. The translation is not wrong, however. That is what the words do say in Tibetan: mind is conventional truth. Like the vase is conventional truth, the glass is conventional truth. The person is conventional truth, I and you are conventional truth. Did you get some idea now about the ultimate and conventional truth? It is all about the perceiving point, from what angle you perceive. The word we use in Tibetan is ngo wo chi la tog pa ta de. That is what I was told when I was a kid. I didn’t even know what that meant. But I could say it. It really means: there is nothing separate from whatever it is, like the glass or whatever. But the aspects are either: free of inherent existence or what you are observing.

Hopefully that will give you some opening. We cannot hope to make that absolutely clear here. We won’t. I believe that will only become absolutely clear when you become enlightened. I think that is how you measure enlightenment. But it is a great thing. Such a simple, little verse can convey that much of a message. The verse after that will probably follow.

But before we go into it, the 2nd verse raises another question: is emptiness, the freedom of inherent existence, beyond the scope of mind? That is a big question, honestly. If it is beyond the scope of mind it should not exist. Right and wrong has been judged by this. We have a tremendous problem to decide between right and wrong. If everybody says it is wrong, we will also say it. If everybody says it is right, we will agree that it is right, especially when we see people we trust saying it is. And if they say it is wrong, we also would like to say that it is wrong. Many of us, if we are close to the liberals, when they say it is right, we will say, ‘That is a good one.’ That’s what we do. When the conservatives say that something is good, many of us will say, “Oh no, that’s not good – because the conservatists said so.” That’s what we do, right?

Sometimes we have good reasons. We say that environmental policies are good, because they don’t hurt the elements. But many times we don’t have good reasons. We have great difficulties to judge right and wrong. Buddha shared with us that every experiential mind is not necessarily a reliable mind. A lot of us would like to say, “To have something absolutely reliable becomes very intellectual. I am not interested. I like to have experience.” How many of us think that way? But experiences are not necessarily correct. Experiences can be contradicted by absolute reliable minds. The basis of right and wrong is based on whether an absolute reliable mind can contradict it or not. When it contradicts and finds it wrong, then it is wrong. When it agrees and finds that it is right then it is right. We cannot judge the future until it actually comes in. When the future has happened, then we can look back and say, “Oh that was wrong. How wrong I was”, or “I did right.” Again, the base is this.

To conclude, when this verse says that “the ultimate is beyond the scope of mind”, it really means that the ultimate is beyond the scope of dualistic mind. The ultimate truth as seen directly by the extraordinary mind at the meditative level cannot be seen by us. That is “beyond the scope of the dualistic mind.” It doesn’t mean that mind cannot see the ultimate reality. If mind does not see ultimate reality then ultimate reality does not exist. If ultimate reality does not exist, what are we trying to do here? Why do we put so much effort into the spiritual path? Why should we do purification, study and what are we trying to gain? You cannot gain something that doesn’t exist!

We may like to think: we are looking for wisdom. That is emptiness, which doesn’t exist – because it is empty. But it doesn’t mean that.

The text I am reading from goes further. It says

Buddha is known as the totally enlightened one because he sees both truths as they are. He knows and sees emptiness.

We have been saying on the first day that the base on which we work is the two truths. Every existence is either ultimate or conventional truth. The text goes on,

There is no ultimate separate from the relative. There is no relative separate from the ultimate. Ultimate emptiness is relative and vice versa. Without one the other won’t be there. It is like the created and the impermanent.

Remember, one of the Buddhist four seals is that all created phenomena are impermanent. The example is sound. Sound is impermanent, because it is created. So ‘impermanent’ and ‘created’ are based on the same object: sound. There is nothing separate. The same goes for the two truths. That is the reason why we say: Form is emptiness, emptiness is form. And that is why we are free of the two extremes: existentialism and nihilism. That is because form and emptiness are one. If they were other, then it would go to one of the extremes or to both.

Actually I learnt that when I was a kid, ten or eleven years old. So when I started reading this afternoon it was as though I had never read it. This particular book is written by one of my teachers.

In the Tibetan tradition we make a statement and then we prove it by quoting from Buddha’s writings. Then we try to prove it by reasoning. You always have both, quotation and reasoning. The reasoning in regard to the two truths is that reliable and not reliable are direct opponents. If it is reliable, it won’t be non-reliable. If it is non-reliable, it wont’ be reliable. There can’t be a third way. That sounds like there is no gray, just black and white.

When I first came to the United States my friends kept on telling me, “You don’t know gray. Everthing is either black or white.” I think it is on this basis. If you find something reliable it is clear that it is not non-reliable. If you find something that is not reliable it is clear that it is not reliable. There is nothing in between. There is no gray here – maybe it doesn’t exist. Therefore, for the perception that finds ultimate truth, whatever exists, that does exist and whatever doesn’t exist for it, it doesn’t exist. This is because it is the perception that finds ultimate truth. We don’t have that yet, but we will get it, for sure.

Earlier I asked, “Is the perception of freedom from inherent existence an object of mind or not? If not, it should not exist.” Now you can see it. It is because mind is reliable. That doesn’t mean that our mind is reliable, nor are all minds reliable. By negating non-reliable minds you gain reliable perceptions. That is also the reason why we say, “By negating negativities, you gain positivities.”

I often say that ultimate enlightenment and all spiritual development is becoming free of negativities and negative emotions, rather than finding something different, like being struck by lightning, which is something which we always look for. This is also said by many traditional Tibetan teachers.

When we first teach Buddhism we use that explanation. This is based on the blessings, transmissions, and so on. Even in Tibet, these are the first points we talked, because it makes it easier for people to get it and understand. You may not get it completely then. I don’t want to say you just think you are getting it, but somehow you are brought in within the framework and thereby get a chance and opportunity to go through with it.

Ultimately, spiritual development is nothing transmittable. Sure, we give some transmissions, but they are seeds and capabilities, not the real understanding, not the real spiritual development. Buddha himself said,

Negativities cannot be washed away by holy water.

Actually, in vajrayana we always do that. We visualize that the holy water comes and washes all the negativities away. Also the initiation is full of washing away negativities. But in his statement, Buddha himself said that. Further he said,

Spiritual development is not transferable, nor can the Buddha remove sufferings with his hands.

That is why he taught the Truth of Suffering. If sufferings could be taken away by hand, there should be no truth of suffering. Why should people have to suffer? So Buddha said that all that can happen only by knowing the truth. And this is the truth we are talking about. Absolute reality is the truth we are talking about.

When I teach the Three Principles of the Path I always say,

“The essence of emptiness is relativity.”

When you start looking for emptiness you can’t find something called zero. You have to look through. That is the reason why form is emptiness and emptiness is form. That is why the emptiness of the vase is the vase itself. Nothing other than the vase is the emptiness of the vase. But just by seeing the vase, you don’t see the emptiness of the vase. Even the impermanence of the vase is not the emptiness of the vase. If that were so it would be easy. We could pick up the vase and break it on the floor and we should see the impermanence of the vase there. That doesn’t give us the true nature of the vase.

If you do get the true nature of one thing, whether it is a vase, the mind, a wall, or anything, then it covers everything. Nagarjuna said,

Once you see the true reality of one thing, you will see the true reality of everything.

You don’t have to go one by one; your truth, my truth, his truth and her truth. One covers all.

I hope I was able to very roughly explain this verse:

Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect.

The intellect is called conventional reality.

Actually, I have not yet explained the second half of the verse. So far I did say that the vase is ultimate truth and conventional truth, both.

There is one other thing I wanted to tell you. That will become clear from the next two verses.

Verse 3

In the light of this, people are seen to be of two types,

contemplative and ordinary persons.

The ordinary folks are superseded by the contemplative.

The translator uses the term ‘ordinary’. I used, instead of ‘ordinary’, ‘one who depends on fear-based perception of impermanence’. ‘Superseded’ means that they know better than you do [laughs]. I don’t think that it is quite what it says, but lets talk about that next week.

Saying that the ultimate is beyond the scope of the mind is telling us that the wisdom we try to develop is discriminating wisdom. I want to make that clear to you. Normally, discrimination is considered not to be good. We want to let the mind go as much as it wants to, let it fly wherever it wants to and find whatever it could find, without any limitations and restrictions. However, our goal is ultimate enlightenment, freedom.

Freedom is everybody’s goal anyway, spiritual or non-spiritual. The goal is freedom. Everybody wants to be free of suffering, have less pain, more happiness.

But here we have a very specific thing: we want to become enlightened. At least we want to be free of all fear-based activities, all samsaric activities. When we are looking for the specific wisdom that can lead us to that level, then it becomes discriminating wisdom. Mind is such that if you let it go it will go. There is no limit for whatsoever. If you have all the time in the world to find the truth there is the possibility that mind could find it. But it may take a long time. So far, from the beginning of existence until now, for millions of years, our mind did not find it. Only a few people have found it, such as Buddha, Jesus and so forth, not all of us. That is why discriminating wisdom is necessary. We don’t have all the time in the world. When we die everything will be totally different. Whatever we built up, except spiritual realizations, but everything else, including all the intellectual knowledge, even certain kinds of intellectual knowledge on the spiritual path, will all go. When we die it is all gone. It will be taken away by the shock or whatever it is. Our time is limited. Therefore, discriminating wisdom is recommended. The Buddhas has already found it and thereby all the others have found it. That is why discriminating is necessary for us.

Wild, unlimited thoughts have their own qualities. But on the spiritual path it is not a great thing to follow indiscriminate thoughts. We may not have enough time to find true reality by these thoughts. What we need is a very specific wisdom. This is called ‘emptiness’ or ‘selflessness’ or ‘I-lessness’. That is why there is the need to discriminate. It is not that we are trying to be conservative and restrictive. We are not trying to be traditionalist or religious fanatics. But it is the idea that we won’t have to again and again try to find out but rather catch what Buddha has already found out and follow that.

I very often say and feel it sometimes: Had Buddha been a Caucasian male and written down everything he found, today that would be called ‘scientific understanding’. Unfortunately, it didn’t happen that way. So it is called ‘spiritual’. If you water it down even more it becomes ‘faith’. And you can water it down even more.

But if you look how it is all explained through solid reasoning you will be convinced. The reasoning is sometimes very old style. It may be difficult to conjunct it well with our mind. That can sometimes become a problem. Otherwise, I like to say that this wisdom is very, very grounded. I can’t call it scientific, but it is based on very solid reasoning and on very logical points. Professor Thurman likes to call it ‘Inner Science’. Whether there is a difference between inner and outer science I have no idea. But what I know is that it is very logical. And this is trying to lead to a very specific wisdom on one point. All the minds will ultimately be directed to one point and one point only. That is not a matter of faith, but it is really based on reasons. That is why even in the beginning of the chapter Shantideva points out the two truths. And I could just leave it there, say that there are two truths and go on. But by raising questions and doubts you should get something to think and get it. The ultimate wisdom you can really only get this way. Otherwise you could try to find it with indiscriminate thoughts for 200 eons. That is why the sutra system says,

First you generate bodhimind and then you contemplate for three countless eons.

This is because of indiscriminate thoughts. So now I have given you the difference between discriminating wisdom and indiscriminate thoughts. I like to call it wisdom, otherwise you can also say: discriminating thoughts and indiscriminate thoughts. That’s what it really is.

Today we talked about the two truths, the conventional and the ultimate. We made it clear that both are one. Form is emptiness, emptiness is form. Form is no other than emptiness, emptiness is no other than form. The two truths are based on two perceptions of two separate individuals, extraordinary and ordinary. The ordinary perceive a self within one or more of the five skandhas. We try to identify the self as one of these skandhas, which include mind. All of these are impermanent and that is why this perception is based on fear. Someone who goes beyond that is supposed to see ultimate truth. The perceptions of these two categories of people are called conventional and ultimate. No one can see both together, unless they are enlightened. I think we have come to that point.

Here I would like to close my shop. Next week it is going to be easier than today. The two truths are a very tough nut to crack.

20050208GRAABODHI9

Welcome everybody. I believe we are meeting tonight because the first meeting was cancelled du to snow. To substitute that we are meeting tonight. As you know we are at the beginning of the wisdom chapter of Shantideva's Bodhisattvacharyavatara.

We finished the first verse quite easily. But the second verse is the most complicated verse.

Verse 2

This truth is recognized as being of two kinds: conventional and ultimate.

Ultimate reality is beyond the scope of the intellect.

The intellect is called conventional reality.

I have almost been talking the same subject in New York on Thursdays. Most of you will have the transcripts available because they are on line and can be downloaded. But what you really need to get clear here is the two truths. I could easily just name them and move on. That can be moot. But it is a little more than that. Even the translations differ. Some say conventional and ultimate, some say relative and absolute. m

One most important thing is: Any spiritual practice, or if you just want to have knowledge in this, must be based on three things:

Where we are - the base

what we do - the path

what we aim for - the result

Without knowing where you, what you are doing and what you hope to achieve, just do something, that is joining the hahayana. You can just laugh, that's it. To be in a real yana, a vehicle that can deliver you where you want to go, you have to follow either the hinayana, mahayana or vajrayana. I am not supposed to be using the term hinyana but I do that here purposely to make it more clear. Without base, path and result you don't have a spiritual structure. Even if you just want to find out initially what is in Buddhism, and you don't have any base or foundation, it really becomes just hahayana.

The base, the ground we stand on, is the two truths. That is why I cannot just brush this away by simply stating that there are two truths. I need to complete this statement tonight, because today is the last of the initial first four sessions. If I just leave it, I don't know if I am not doing you a disservice. Actually, this subject is going to come up a number of times during the course of this teachings.

What is the ultimate truth? Our verse says, "Ultimate truth is beyond the scope of the intellect". When we look in our mind there are two categories:

the mind that can observe things extremely finely and in detail and concentrates

the mind that roughly looks and draws some conclusion

The ultimate truth will be not the usual mind, the mind that you and I possess. That mind might will not be able to see it clearly. That means that the mind other than the one at our level, the wisdom mind of the aryas, the mind of the extraordinary people, is able to find it. It is something that our ordinary mind cannot perceive. What we perceive is called 'relative truth'. I am presenting that to you in a very rough way so that you have something to hold. Otherwise you hear so much about the conventional and ultimate truths, and you have nothing to hold.

Why can the ordinary mind like ours not perceive ultimate truth? It is not that our mind is not good enough, but it doesn't have the capacity to focus strongly and solidly. Also, our mind doesn't have the capacity to analyze detailedly and profoundly. Last year we did a one year meditation course. You remember, looking at that, our mind is not a meditative mind. We will not even reach to the first level out of the nine stages with the mind we have. Some people may, but most of us don't. That doesn't mean that our mind is bad. It means that we haven't utilized our mind well. We let it run by itself according to its own habitual patterns. Our habitual patterns won't let us focus on anything. If we try to force ourselves to focus on one thing for a few seconds, we probably think we go crazy. I haven't heard somebody telling me that but if I would hear somebody telling me that 'this is not the American way', I won't be surprised.

That shows that we haven't utilized our mind and its capacity. That's why we don't have focus. Without that we cannot find the reality. We can also hear something in between the lines also: the focusing mind can at the same time be the analyzing mind. So focusing doesn't just mean to sit there and stare at the microphone and say: microphone, microphone, microphone. You will be looking at the microphone and notice: Oh, there is this fuzzy sponge that covers the actual microphone. Wonder how it looks inside. All that is still part of focusing, although you are transiting from one point to another. But we can't do that. We will be looking at the microphone and say: "microphone, microphone, oops, there is a glass of water, here is water…" We make that big jump.

When we say, "our mind cannot perceive ultimate truth", it doesn't mean that the mind cannot do that, but only the mind that has not developed, and is not trained. That is acceptable to any culture. Everybody agrees that a trained mind sees things differently than an untrained mind. Take a designer: the designer's eye can see straight and crooked, matching and not matching, symmetrical and not symmetrical. . That doesn't mean that any other eye is able to see the same. If you are not trained it is acceptable if you cannot see it. Similarly, the eyes and mind of a doctor can examine a patient, and judging from the color of the face, the shape, the pain and all that, and diagnose what illness they are suffering from. Our ordinary mind cannot see it. That is commonly known. Likewise, the lawyers can look through the papers and see a lot of things which we cannot see! That's why we have to hire lawyers and pay them. That is very much accepted.

Likewise, it is not looking down on our mind to say, "The ordinary mind cannot perceive ultimate truth". Our mind is not bad, it is just not trained. When your mind is not trained, it may still have the capacity, but it is not utilized. An artist can see things I can't. I won't even know whether a line is straight or crooked. If someone tells me, "This line goes this way and that way and therefore it is straight", I will probably say, "Maybe, yes." The ultimate truth is not perceivable by the mind of our ordinary level. It is the wisdom of the aryas, as the traditional texts call it. These are extraordinary persons. By saying that you get another message.

Whatever we ordinary persons perceive at this moment is the conventional truth. It is not that we don't see truth. The truth we perceive is the conventional truth. That gives us one more understanding: the mind can really see the ultimate. Finding the ultimate truth with a reliable ultimate mind [of an arya] is perhaps the definition of ultimate truth. Whatever truth we can perceive with the ordinary mind, is a truth and that is the definition of conventional truth.

You have the definition of the two truths. The understanding behind the definition is that an extraordinary mind can perceive something extraordinary. That is the ultimate truth. The usual mind can perceive some truth and that is conventional truth. That is the basic understanding we can get.

That understanding is a good seed which will grow a lot and lead to a lot of things. My indiscriminate thinking leads me to think that what the ultimate mind perceives and what the ordinary mind perceives will be directly opposite. With our ordinary mind we think that everything we perceive exists as we perceive it. The nose is really a nose, the ear is an ear, the mouth is a mouth, white is white and black is black. The head is a head and the chest is a chest. We look at ourselves as a person and say "I". What do we really perceive? On the basis of our five skandhas we think, "That is me, Joh Blo". But Joh Blo is only a name. That is not you. So who are you? When we look inwards it seems as if all our skandhas merge together into a lump which we can call "me". Our ordinary mind will perceive and acknowledge that and it is. But the extraordinary mind will go beyond that and ask, "Which one are you talking about? The form, sound or smell? Are you a sound, or are you a smell? Are you a taste? Are you physical form?

If you are physical form then when that form disappears, do you as a person disappear too? As physical form you have so many aspects. So which of them are you? When you keep looking from that angle you will finally find out that there is nothing called 'me'. I simply exist on the combination of things that are part and parcel of me, such as my mind, my body, my feelings, perceptions and so on. You understand that 'me' is just the simple combination of all these things. There is nothing beyond that. If you search you are not going to find it.

With that we may be traveling towards the ultimate truth by taking the first one or two steps. Our conventional mind will never be able to perceive that. We will get very scared. We will flatly deny it and we don’t want to hear about it. In other words, the basis on which the "I" is labeled is just the five skandhas or aggregates. These are form, feeling, perception, [compositional factors] and mind. These are all impermanent. Therefore, they are not only changing, but they can be destroyed and disappear. Since we are based on these, we always carry the fear of losing, of not making it. We are always afraid of something. This is because of the conventional truth of "I" being based on the five aggregates which are impermanent, changing and finally will be destroyed. We carry that fear all the time.

This mind is exaggerated. The mind doesn't know it is just a combination. Our mind thinks the "I" is something we have to protect and it could not find any other way to protect it except through pre-emptive methods - attacking the enemy. That is hatred. On the other hand the same perception leads to obsession to the desired objects and to jealousy towards our competition. They are all exaggerated minds. The ultimate truth will cut all of them. The basis on which we build will be realized as not existing. We are holding something which is not there. That is the reason why emptiness is me ga and not ma yin ga. Something that we thought was there has been recognized as not being there. Something we perceive as being there is being negated. It is not that something wrongly perceived is being corrected. That is also the reason why emptiness is empty of self and not empty of other.

There are many traditions that accept that emptiness is empty of 'other'. That is not something to be surprised about. If the glass of water is empty of being a clock, that is nothing to be surprised about. We can easily see that the glass of water is free of being a clock. That is not emptiness. But if you see that the glass of water is free of being a glass of water, that is something. So it is not free of 'other', but free of 'self'. Western translators have to add up "ness", so it becomes 'emptiness'. The translators and professors and everybody, they are afraid of 'empty'. So they add up the - ness. They make it into 'emptiness'.

The two verses are further supported by Buddha's statements which he made when he was reunited with his father and his family. There is a sutra called "Reunion Sutra". There Buddha clearly says,

The conventional is the behavior of the jig ten.

Somebody told me yesterday, "In Tibetan the world is called jig ten, which means everything is falling apart." That may or may not be true. But jig ten means "based on something that is subject to destruction". We are the ones; we are based on our five aggregates which are doing to disappear. Nothing is permanent. Even if it were permanent, we wouldn't like it. You don't want to drag a 500 year old body around, do you? Nobody wants that, although we all want to get old. But when you are there you don't want it. Feeling is the same thing, recognition is the same thing. You don't want to see the same thing again and again, like in the "Groundhog Day" movie. In the Reunion Sutra Buddha further says,

The ultimate is not to be known and cannot be understood

At that time, the people Buddha was talking to might not have been fit to understand the ultimate truth. In that context I would like to raise the following point. It is about inherent existence. You have to have to have some idea about emptiness. If you ask anybody what emptiness is they will usually reply, "Freedom from inherent existence". That is a common mantra. I don't know whether the people who use that word really know what inherent existence is. I am sure some of the upcoming verses will deal with that. Just for now: This "Freedom of inherent existence", is that perceivable by mind? According to Shantideva's verse it is not. However, if the mind cannot establish the non-existence of something that tells you that it does exist. In other words, it's non-existence cannot be proven. It is very much like in the court of law. You are regarded as innocent until proven guilty. Similarly, if the mind cannot establish that something does not exist you have to consider it to exist. That is the rule. Nagarjuna says,

rang zhin me ba nyi la na rang zhin nyi du rab du gyur

If you go away from the non-existence of inherent existence,

by that you establish inherent existence.

In other words, if mind cannot prove that there is no inherent existence, indirectly it establishes that there is inherent existence. That is how mind works. This functions like black and white. There is no gray. So, Shantideva saying that ultimate truth is not perceivable by ordinary mind indirectly tells you that although ultimate truth is not to be established by ordinary mind, it can be established by a profound logical mind. That does not have to be a highly spiritual thing. A profound logical mind can establish that.

To conclude, the ordinary mind is able to perceive and establish the conventional truth. The mind beyond that, the profound mind of the aryas' logic is able to establish the ultimate truth. In order to understand this, if there is time and if you have interest and if you really want to know more you should read the madyamaka literature. For example, it says that whatever exists as it is, that is the ultimate truth. Words like suchness came in for that reason. Whatever the ultimate mind perceives exists as it is perceived. Tibetan terms like de ko na nyi, de zhin nyi and so on mean 'just like that' or 'such as this'. That is the mind which perceives ultimate reality.

Verse 3

In the light of this, people are seen to be of two types: the contemplative and the ordinary person. The ordinary folks are superseded by the contemplatives.

In the light of this… refers to the two truths and what can be seen by who and what and so on. So in regard to that there are two types of persons. Allan Wallace translates them as 'contemplatives' and 'ordinary persons'. We have seen that the two truths are the basis on which we are standing.

So which kind of person follows what? 'Ordinary person' is not meant in the sense of "House of Commons" and "House of Lords", but rather in the sense of jig ten pa, those who depends on the impermanent base that is used as the identity of the person. That is the simple way: we see it and we function that way. The other type of persons is called here 'contemplatives'. The Tibetan word is nel jor, which means 'yogi'. We all know what that is. In other words we are talking about yogis and non-yogis.

Those who are following and functioning on the ultimate level are called 'yogis'. Those who are functioning on the conventional truth level are called jig ten pas, "worldly persons". This time you have to think simply that jig stands for the impermanent form and pa is a person based on that. We are form-based persons. We use that for our identity. Our driver's license is proof that we exist. If you go somewhere and say, "I am So and so", and they ask you to prove it, you show them your driver's license and that is the proof, right? So we base our identity on form and we duplicate a picture of it, some authority signs and stamps it and that is our identity. That really shows us that we are form-based persons. No wonder that we are always afraid. We are afraid, whether we are educated or uneducated, rich or poor, young or old, man or woman. Everybody has so much fear and that is because we are form-based people and form is impermanent. We are on shaky ground. This verse says that the ordinary folks are "superseded by the contemplatives". This is not because the yogis are more powerful and overpower you. It is not a bureaucratic ordering system. The perception of the jig ten person will be contradicted and even defeated by the perception of the yogis. It can be contradicted and proven to be wrong. We ordinary persons think that the form is a source of joy. Our joys are normally based on our form. We think it is mind, but mostly we perceive physical feelings. We think our body gives us joy. So when we want joy we go for all kinds of things, from cigarettes to alcohol, drugs and sex and so on. It is because we see our joy connected with our form. So whatever shaky thing we can get we think that is great joy. I am glad we did not get electric shocks!

The yogis see differently. They don't see that joy is dependent on the body, not even on the mind. I am supposed to be Buddhist, but let me say it this way: jogis see the joy on the soul, rather than mind or body. We see only the body, so we do everything related to the body. 99.9% of the commercials on radio and television are just there to give some buzz in your body - that's all. It is because we see that as joy.

But that is not true. The ultimate joy is not physical and not even mental. It is the joy of the soul, from the bottom of wherever you are. That is why there are two different views and that is why the division comes between the yogis and the non-yogis. So the views of the non- yogis are defeated by the yogis.

Within these yogis' views there are also different levels, the higher levels of understanding defeat the lower ones. That is why the spiritual development comes in gradual stages. That is why it is not instantaneous and not so simple. It is a little more complicated, because our nature is such.

Verse 4

Due to the difference in their intelligence, even contemplatives are refuted by successively higher ones by means of analogies accepted by both parties, regardless of what they aim to prove.

I presume that 'analogies' is similar to 'examples'. The lower yogis' understanding will be refuted by the higher yogis' understanding. For example the Chittamatrins, the Mind Only School, will accept that form is truly existent. This is refuted by the Madhyamakas, the Middle Path School, because form cannot truly exist. This is because form is impermanent and changing. It does exist, but not truly. That is different.

We are establishing here that yogis are digging into the ultimate truth and non-yogis are stuck with the conventional truth. I suppose this much is what I can say tonight. Since it is the last talk in this series I want you to have something to carry home. What we did so far is that all other practices and teachings are like blind without the eye of wisdom. Chandrakirti said that all other practices are like a bunch of blind people. They don't know which direction to go. There is no perfect guide, no eye that sees. So wisdom is the eye. Yet, wisdom alone cannot do it. You must have love and compassion on one side and wisdom on the other side. Where do these two things come from? They come from the basis of ultimate and conventional truth. Any spiritual practice that is directly dealing with finding the ultimate truth is a direct cause of the Buddha mind. I am talking from the Buddhist perspective. It is the mind of total knowledge. Love, compassion, etc, will bring the form body of total enlightenment.

In order to achieve the mind and body of perfection you have to have the conventional practice of love and compassion and the ultimate practice of wisdom. It is not only based on practice but on the reality as well. Based on the two truths and the two paths you get the two results, the mind and body of enlightenment.

Yet, the ultimate cannot be perceived by the conventional mind of people. We are not trained to see beyond that. The conventional is what we perceive and the ultimate is what yogis perceive. We are not yet yogis, because we base our identity on our physical form, our aggregates. We are based on an unreliable source of identity. It is unreliable, impermanent and will finally disappear. Therefore we base our joy on physical experiences or even mental experiences. Yogis find joy in their deep being instead, rather than in physical, mental or emotional experiences.

When we really look for the spiritual path we look to find the joy in the deep being itself. We also have to destroy the basis on which we build our fears. This is also the source of all our negative emotions. I perceive my temporary identity as me, therefore I protect all that is 'my', with hatred and obsession. Thus we establish a spiritual practitioner. Our target is not only to reverse our negative emotions, but to destroy the source and re-establish the simple, pure being. I guess that is as far as we have come. Think about it, work with it and you have something to hold from the weeks you have spent with me here.

We will meet again on March 8, 2005. We will have another series of 6 Tuesdays. Thank you so much for being here. This is quite a complex and deep subject. It takes quite some time to dig into this. I didn't just want to lick around the point but bite into it. We need something solid. We need to bite.

One thing about the upcoming Yamantaka initiation and retreat: a number of our people are a little scared of vajrayana. That is a misunderstanding. There is nothing to be scared of. This is an extraordinary opportunity. Yes, at the beginning you don't know what you are doing and where you are. All of us, including myself, swim through that lack of understanding. However, the tantra itself says

vajaryana is like the utamvara flower

This is the flower that only blooms once when an official Buddha comes. This is a hindu-buddhist mythological story. Right now there may be a lot of Buddhas, even among ourselves, but there is only one official Buddha for this period and that is Shakyamuni. That utamvara flower only appears then. Just like that, the opportunity to enter vajrayana is just once in a very long time, more rare than the usual blue moon. It is a great opportunity and one should not push oneself away under the pretext of being careful. Actually you are cutting off your own opportunity. You can see clearly that it does not come very often and is also doesn't last very long. It happens to be a very fine time now with a very fine opportunity. Had you been here two decades ago you would never even have been interested. If you come here two decades from now, I am not even sure if it still exists or not. That's what it is - a great opportunity. One has to think of that too.

20050308GRAABODHI9 (PART II)

Welcome to this new segment of the wisdom course. Today you will have noticed that we added up a new mantra in our prayers and that is the mantra of Manjushri. Like Avalokiteshvara is the Buddha of Compassion, Manjushri is the Buddha of Wisdom. Since we are talking the wisdom subject we have included the mantra of the Buddha of Wisdom here. In Tibetan Buddhism the image of Manjushri is available everywhere. In our sanctuary we don't have one, because some people had objected to having so many tangkhas hanging around. I also thaugbt, the simpler it is the better. We took a lot of tangkas from the walls. In any case, the pictures or images of the Buddha of Wisdom show him either in orange or white color, holding a sword and a book. The sword represents cutting through ignorance and negativities. The book is giving you the wisdom message. This is the transcendental wisdom. The mantra is

OM ARAPATZANA DHIH

If I try to explain this mantra now, it is going to take a lot of time. So lets not explain the meaning of each word. But I would like to explain the letter A at least, the first letter after OM. So the letter A is the most important vowel in the alphabet of any language. If you can't say A you will never be able to express anything. Whether it is an eastern language or a western language, you can only put consonants together by using A. It is the life of consonants. Without that you cannot make sounds. The first sound that babies make is also A. Anybody, anywhere, can't make a sound without A. It is the life of every sound you can produce. It comes from deep down, from inside. Also, you don't have much to explain. A is very basic.

That, however, gives you a strong message. It is wisdom itself, the message of emptiness, of meaninglessness, of all kinds of things. It is extremely important. I won't have time to explain the rest of the mantra, but the last syllable is DHIH, the seed syllable of Manjushi. At the end of the mantra we are saying DHIH one hundred times in one breath, very fast. There are some visualizations and meditations to go along with this. When you do this right and nicely, it helps tremendously not to lose your memory. I should and cannot say it, but it is almost like anti-Alzheimer. You won't forget, you will be very clear. That is the reality. I briefly wanted to introduce this here, since we are talking on the basis of the wisdom teachings. There are a tremendous amount of meditations just on the letter DHIH alone. This is just an introduction. I am just basically telling you what it is and what you can do with it and for what purpose. It is not the right time to explain the visualizations, like the seven ways of building the wisdoms. You can gradually get to know this. I cannot spend the time right now and it also might not be appropriate to speak about this here openly for various reasons.

You may wonder why I introduce this if I cannot explain this in detail. But we have introduced some visualization and that already will be very helpful, even if it is only a little bit.

Now I would like to continue where we left off last time. Verses 3-5 actually go together.

Verse 3

In the light of this, people are seen to be of two types: the contemplative and the ordinary person. The ordinary folks are superseded by the contemplatives.

Verse 4

Due to the difference in their intelligence, even contemplatives are refuted by successively higher ones by means of analogies accepted by both parties, regardless of what they aim to prove.

Verse 5

Ordinary people see and imagine things as real and not illusory. It is in this respect that there is disagreement between the contemplative and ordinary beings. Even the objects of direct perception, such as form and the like, are established by consensus and not by verifying cognition. That consensus is false as is the general agreement that pure things are impure.

Let me explain: We introduced the two truths in verse 2 and accordingly, there are two types of individuals, those who see the absolute truth and those who don't. Those who see absolute truth are the 'contemplatives', and those who only see the conventional, are ordinary. Contemplatives are actually the yogis. Those who have yoga are yogis. In the west, the best known yoga is the physical yoga, the hatha yoga. But here they are talking about the mental yoga. In this total existence, there are two categories, the yogis and the non-yogis. In other words, these are those who have spiritual interest and those who don't really have that much interest. It is the difference between those who are extraordinary and those who are not extraordinary, but normal. This terminology of 'ordinary' and 'extraordinary' is found very often in the spiritual field.

This division is based on reason. It doesn't mean that certain people are special and others are not. It is not like one is male and another female and one is considered superior to the others. Ancient cultures may have said that too, but here that's not what they are talking about. Nor are they comparing black and white, eastern or western people, but it is the individual people's understanding of how things exist. It is the level of understanding of the individual.

At first, everybody, anybody whoever existed, is ordinary. I am not talking about God here, but about normal circumstances. Out of that ordinariness, one can transfer oneself into the category of an extraordinary being, a yogi. Normally, we think a yogi is someone who is wearing some funny dress, puts their hair up and keeps it a little dirty, and wears some little dhoti or whatever. If you don't look like that you may not be a yogi or yogini. That is our usual understanding.

But here the word actually used is jig ten. I would like to translate that as worldly people. The others would be the non-worldly people. You may think that the worldly people are those who have desire to possess things in the world and are after worldly comfort and so forth. And then you think the non-worldly people are those 'spiritual' people who don't have too much desire - true or false, that is the idea we get. But that is not the case.

The word jig ten is particularly referring to individual human beings whose interest, whose happiness and joy depends on something impermanent, something unreliable, something that by nature will go away. These are worldly people. There is a second understanding behind this world. jig means also fear. This fear is related to something that doesn't last. ten means to rely on. We have some big thing that is not reliable, fear-oriented and that is our dependence on our physical form, our body, our feelings, our five skandhas, but particularly the body. In reality, what is going to happen to this body? We all know. In the end it is going to be either packed into a beautiful box or cremated or whatever. But it is never going to remain, even though you may bury it inside a temple, inside a monastery, or inside a chapel, palace, tomb or wherever. Therefore, the nature of this particular physical thing that we rely so totally rely on, is destruction. It is going to go. Those of us who depend on that are called 'worldly' or 'ordinary'. Does that make better sense now? Those who can see beyond that and function accordingly are called yogis or extraordinary persons. You become special because you shift your base.

As long as we are ordinary we all depend on that physical form, no matter whatever you think. From the non-buddhist perspective we talk about happiness, going to the right side of God. Even if you have buddhist influence like in Theravada, we talk about samsara and nirvana. If you are mahayana or vajrayana buddhist you are talking about total enlightenment and buddhahood. We work and pray. We function and we strive for it. But still we are based on this physical base, thinking that this basis is capable of bringing us to the higher levels.

Many people here in this country do not believe in reincarnation. Those of us who believe in it, we still think we will transfer this very person to the next life. We know very well that we can't bring this physical body back, however, then we think that this particular consciousness can come back. We still rely on the unreliable. That is the reason why ordinary and extraordinary are differentiated. Each translator plays with those words and that is how it becomes 'contemplatives' and 'ordinary'. The real message is the same. The differentiation of being ordinary and extraordinary is not based on gender, color or celebrity status. It is simply on what basis the individual is functioning. We seek enlightenment or nirvana, but we still think we can transfer this particular being into nirvana. That is ordinary thinking. That is why Buddha calls us ordinary. He doesn't say that because he thinks he is special and we are not. Nor are lamas, monks or nuns any more special than lay people. The meaning is in the word jig ten, one who depends totally on something which will finally disappear, something unreliable.

In our mind, when we are seeking happiness and joy, the basis on which we are really seeking is the physical and mental identity combined together. The ordinary persons, in their perception, understanding, in their ideas of what they are seeking, who is seeking, often raise the question "Who am I?" How many people spend their life on the question, "Who am I?" They do that in the west, which is very unfortunate.

I remember an incident. It was some years ago. The Buddhist magazine Tricycle organizes regularly an event called Change Your Mind Day. I think Jewel Heart has organized one of them in Michigan one year. So Tricycle do one every year in Central Park, New York. They asked me to speak there several times and one year I did. Some friends were asking me, "What are you going to talk about? Have you prepared anything?" I said, "No. I never prepare." "So what are you going to speak on?" I said, 'I don't know yet. I like to listen to the speaker before me and pick up from there and say something." When I got there all these people started talking to me. I met Michael Roach that day too. So I couldn't really listen to what the earlier speakers before me were saying. Then it was almost my turn to speak. I tried to pay attention. There was a nice, beautiful girl, wearing a black robe, sitting there in the terrible bright sun shine, the whole day, sweating. You could see it, the water was literally dripping from her. She was the one keeping everything together. The speakers would come and go, but she stayed and kept everything together. So now she was saying, "We spent the whole day here to find out, 'Who am I?" So I thought, "I am not interested to know who I am, why should I?" Then I thought, "If I say that in my talk, maybe the audience will not like it, as they just spent a tremendous time and energy trying to find out." So I thought, "I better ask somebody". I saw Joseph Goldstein walking by and thought, "Oh, very good, I ask Joseph, because he is very aware of what these people want to know." I was sitting in the grass and had to get up, which takes me quite some time. Then I also had to run after Joseph and he is 6 foot tall and has very long legs. He was walking in great strides and I was running behind him but couldn't catch him at all. I almost followed him to the other side of the tent. Suddenly I could hear a voice from the loudspeaker, "Our next speaker is running down there. Would you mind coming up here?" So I had to go up. I don't know any more whether I said, "I don't care who I am."

From what I understand, just the very words "Who am I?" are already holding 'me' as permanent. Maybe you are thinking the 'me' is somebody who went through the change of lives. With that I don't mean menopause, but the change of lives from birth, death and rebirth. So there is continuation. But the idea of taking that as continuing identity clearly indicates our thinking that we are based on our identity. This puts us in the category of ordinary persons.

As we have seen, the ordinary perception is not really true. It can be refuted. Maybe this term is too dialectical. In other words, the perception we usually have is not true reality and that can be proved by the extraordinary mind. We will be convinced by that mind and then we will become an extraordinary person. We move from the category of ordinary persons to the extraordinary persons, because we 'get it', we understand it and know it. That knowledge and understanding is what makes the transition. The extraordinary person's understanding is transmitted to us and through that understanding we become extraordinary.

Whenever we talk about joy and happiness, what are we talking about? If we trace that within ourselves, we are talking about our identity. Joy, bliss, happiness, is identified mostly with our physical being. We may say, "I don't care about physical things, I want mental happiness." We say that and we think we believe that, but mostly it is physical and to a certain extent mental. Extraordinary persons are able to refute the validity of that. Within the ranks of extraordinary persons, there is also a differentiation. The higher ones will refute the lower ones. This is what is meant in verse 4, when it says: Due to the difference in their intelligence, even contemplatives are refuted by successively higher ones. I do not know if it is has to be by means of analogies accepted by both parties, regardless of what they aim to prove. This probably is too much thinking in dialectical points. But it shows that the extraordinary view even has a variety of differences.

For example, we ordinary persons very much rely on what we see and hear. Our hearing, feeling, seeing and the understanding that is following hearing, seeing, touching, etc, are experienced as one - no separation. What I see and what is really there is experienced as one. Similarly it goes with hearing, feeling, and so on. We don't have that separation. Without separating that we totally rely on what we see and understand. Don't let me elaborate, because that is going to create trouble. Seeing and understanding for us is one. We don't separate. That is also the reason why it is very difficult for us to understand karma. How does karma function? How do cause and effect work? We do understand it to a certain extent. But to really understand is very difficult. Therefore, we look for artificial causes. This goes sometimes so far that for many of us only the material thing count, only what science says is what we believe. We hold that as true and nothing else is true. On the other hand, for some only the spiritual is true, nothing else. To some people, even beyond that, they don't even allow themselves to take medication when they are sick. They say that it is not right. It is against something, against nature, against the wishes of God, etc. All of that is because of this problem: seeing and understanding is all one, not separated.

There are some religious traditions, even within Buddhism, which think and understand that whatever you perceive and think really exists that way. You have to take it as true, because according to them, whatever I see and hear and touch is true, because "I saw it", "I heard it", "I felt it", "I experienced it". That understanding can already transit you from the previous level I just explained. However, this understanding is further refuted by the next better understanding.

According to the Buddhist tradition, the understanding of reality can be categorized in four different segments. Two are Hinayana, and two are Mahayana understandings. The Hinayana level of understanding will more or less rely on what you see, hear and feel. The Mahayana has two major divisions. The less superior of them will state, "It is only mind. Nothing else is true. Mind is what matters. When the mind wants to do it, it can be done. Mind can manifest anything, mind can do this and that and nothing else is there." So this is known as the "Mind Only School" by some. Even though we see something, they say that it is a delusion, a misunderstanding or misinformation from within that effects us and makes us think we see this and that. They say that what you see is not real.

Even our scientists to a certain extent say that. At first you see an object upside down, which is due to some light reflection inside the eye, which then you have to reverse. They give you the example of reading something in a mirror and then without mirror. Traditionally, these examples are given to prove that what you see is not true and only the mind is what matters. It is the mind that influences and manifests everything, mind and only mind. When you reach that category you will be able to refute the view I introduced earlier.

So all that is meant by that little reference in verse 4: Due to the difference in their intelligence, even contemplatives are refuted by successively higher ones. I could just read that and leave it there, fine. But you wouldn't get the idea of who refutes what. You wouldn't get a grip, you wouldn't be able to bite the words. You wouldn't get what this is really talking about. Why am I giving you this boring type of explanation? Because it will ultimately lead you to wisdom, what it really is all about.

Emptiness on the level of Mind Only means that reality is empty of external existence beyond what is created by the mind. That is this particular level of wisdom. Whatever appears, ultimately it is only the mind, free of external existence and influence.

Now, even one level of understanding better than that: there is a school that says that mind only is not quite true. Yes, the mind has so much to do with it, but there has to be external objects. There has to be water. There has to be a glass. If there is only mind and you just think there is a glass of water, no matter how much you drink, it is not going to quench your thirst. Keep on drinking, it won't matter. So there has got to be a glass with water in it. It is not only mind. That won't work.

Why does there have to be a glass of water? The correct mind will perceive a glass of water. A correct mind is one that is not influenced by anything. It can't be a mind that is drunk, high, depressed for too long, influenced by colored eye glasses, influenced by an illness and so on. For example, if you have jaundice, you will even see the white snow as yellow and your white bed sheet will look yellow. Therefore, there has to be a glass and a true mind that correctly perceives it. That is one thing. If there is no glass of water, how can a true mind perceive it? Otherwise you can perceive glasses of water, wherever you look. Remember, there is this joke about the windshield wipers and what they can remind you of…….

The ultimate, the real true wisdom will finally tell you that all is interdependently existent. Nothing of its own exists, nor is it just the mind that is playing all the tricks. It is truly just interdependently existent. Everything, anything, anywhere, is interdependently existent. I exist because you see me. You exist because I see you, I acknowledge you, interdependently. Look at the wall over here: it just depends on the particles it is made of. Look at the table. It is the combination of parts, parcels and particles. If the particles separate, there will be no wall, no table, and even your own head won't be there. That is what is meant by "Freedom from inherent existence or natural existence". That is why when you say something is pure it is free of all faults. I don't have to explain that but 'faults' here are these kinds of faults.

So that is how the higher views refute the lower ones. I briefly brought that up. Looking at every point is very important. We are looking for a spiritual path. What type of path are we seeking? What is our aim? For that you have to check. Maybe your aim is just to become a better person. That is wonderful, but is it enough to qualify for a spiritual path? You can become a better person without having any spiritual path. There are zillions of wonderful people who are not Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Muslim or new age practitioners. They are great and wonderful. Begin to look at it. You will say, "I seek happiness." If you look for "Mitterand's happiness", you will find again what I said earlier, the happiness that is based on our destructive nature. That viewpoint can be refuted. You can say that happiness is not found by looking out for me, but also for my family and friends. You are going to find that ultimately your spiritual goal is not just happiness for yourself, not just personal freedom - although that is already great. The scope of what you are looking for and aiming for will increase and increase and increase and ultimately you reach to the best possible goal. Likewise, the way and how I can achieve that goal will increase and grow. First you say, "I don't want to harm or kill anybody." That is great, wonderful. But is that capable of delivering your goal? You have to find out. Spiritual practice is there to improve yourself. We have to improve the foundation on which we function. The method and know-how that we apply has to be approved. The goal that we are trying to achieve has to improve. This is what Shantideva means when he says, "The successively higher ones refute the lower ones." So this is true for our every day lives, not only for the attainment of wisdom or emptiness. It goes for everything.

If we don't have that, then no matter what you do, it is as the Tibetan teachers say

You are swept away by a powerful current, but as long as your head is not under the water, you still think you are swimming and in control, while being carried away helplessly for miles.

That should not be our spiritual path. I guess I have to stop here. I didn't cover a single verse tonight, just a half verse. But we have to close the shop.

20050615GRAABODHI9

Good evening. There are a number of things I have to talk to you tonight, before I even read more from the verses of this chapter. The other day we read verses 3, 4, and 5. I talked about the perception of the individual, how we look at things. It is almost the same subject that I had to repeat in New York on Thursday. It is quite important. Before we go on reading we have to go more into it. We could just go on reading. That would very easy, but also very difficult. Easy, because we could read the words and explain what they mean, but difficult, because that way you won't get it. The wisdom we are talking about here is the wisdom that knows the truth, not just simply knowledge. When you talk about knowing truth and before you look anywhere else, look within yourself. Remember, this is called vipasyana, internal looking. That means looking inside deeply, within yourself. So you are not looking whether you have your organs in the right place, the lungs, intestines, heart, throat, etc. We are looking for who is me.

The other day I said to find out "Who am I?" is not so important. I didn't clarify that at the time. Then I got a number of responses from a number of people. Some told me that to find out "Who am I?" is extremely important for the individual. Some people told me that this line of questioning is not just a western thing. The Buddhists are concerned with "Who am I?" as well, otherwise why should they have reincarnation? Who is this person and that person? These are very good points.

It is true. A large number of people have invested so much into who they are. To some people it it is very sensitive issue, because of the heavy investment in it. "Me" has to be better and good. A large number of people have that strong investment. Others are also saying, "I am really pure, however, some temporary thing has come in and connected here and there, otherwise it is no big deal and I am pure." So, because of this heavy investment, some people were disappointed. That's what I see.

I am not very clear, but I think there is a section of society who think that to be sure of "Who am I?" is important so that they won't be dominated by others, like people of other gender or race. I think it is very strong there too. Particularly, the door mat issue is coming up because people think, "I am not important, however, it does matter to make the situation right." Or they say, "I am happy to sacrifice anything just not to have trouble", "To make things smooth, I will be happy to dance accorging to the music". You know what I am talking about. That is from the domestic point of view.

From one angle, I can say "Who am I?" is not important. I do have a point on which to make that statement. It is related to the wisdom point. On the other hand, the things that I mentioned are also things to consider. People feel uncomfortable. What I personally meant when I said, "Who am I" is not important" does not mean that self esteem and prestige are not important. I am not saying that at all. One has to maintain one's self esteem. If you can't maintain that you will be dominated by others.

If you look into history it happens all the time. I don't have to look very far. The Han Chinese race is dominating the minorities around them, particularly I can speak about the Tibetan minority, because I am one of them. Here you can really see how one dominates the other. Except, the Tibetans are actually a proud people, a proud society and proud persons. They would rather die with hunger than ask somebody else to give them something. That sort of functions that way. There is a saying in Tibet

Rather than taking a bad name and living in the human land it is better to take a good name and go to hell

That is the normal way of thinking. So they are very proud and have very strong self esteem. But the Han majority is so huge that when they overun the country it overflows with them and you can't do anything. We also have the saying in Tibet

When the land is completely covered with water there cannot be a flat little stone that remains dry

That happens. So then we blame the lack of self esteem and lack of efficiency. That is very normal. I am talking from the Tibetan point of view and you know it is very common in every day life in the family, in society. We all have that problem. There is definitely a lack of self esteem. When I said that "Who am I?" is not important I was not going so far as making a connection between those aspects. I was simply focusing on "Who am I?" in the sense of making myself better. That is often the reason why we want to find out "Who am I?" Psychologists will tell you to go to your background and find out the source of your problems. Of course, no doubt, it will go back two or three generations of life time. It is not even two or three, but definitely millions of lives that the real source for our problems has been going on for. But my point was that the need to improve ourselves is absolutely necessary. However, who we are is absolutely a dependent arising.

For example, I cannot just say "I was Jo Blo". I mean that is fine, but what does that do? Nothing. So it has to be a dependent arising. I used to say, without thinking, I don't kow why, "I was the medicial doctor Jo Blo, of 16th century, in Sussex, England." That makes a little more sense than saying, "I was Jo Blo." The place, the time, the country, the town, everything we are going to find is dependent. The conditions that are brought in are name, place, profession and all of those things. "I was John, the Driver." John is the name, the "driver" is the profession. Or you could say, "I was Driver John."

Then you have to ask, "Which driver John?" The answer could be, "The driver John, who drove the first car that Henry Ford made, in Michigan in the 1940s or 50s?"

Audience: No, 1905 or 1906

Rimpoche: All right, I am sorry, maybe it was 1887. There you go. It doesn't really make that much difference to the individual, spiritually, pschologically, emotionally, what happened then and who we were. These are the points. We as spiritual practitioners are looking forward rather than backward. These are my points. I am not ignoring the issue of letting your guard of self esteem down. I am not encouraging that at all.

When we look at the reality, that is vispasyana, looking inside. The question comes: who is me, rather than who am I? What is that "me"? What is "me" all about? That question has to be within us. It is there. If it is not there, we would be at the level of "a priori". That is the pre-knowledge state. Nobody remains for very long in the a priori state. The moment we shift ourselves to knowledge, we will want to know who that person is and how is that functioning. Who is the traveller? Who is the consumer? That is a very ecomic word! The traditional term is: Who is the eater? Now it is the consumer. Who is the cosumer, the traveller, the goer? We get to this, but a lot of people will not get to it.

You know, all of you here are greatly educated, brilliant people. You have a great deal of information net, a lot of information and experience knitted together. You look at that as a source of strength, of functioning. You draw from there, you pass your days by drawing the strength from the information-and experience net you have. You don't penetrate beyond that information net. It really does not touch deeper. A lot of people function on that level, manage day by day, go that way. That is called happy-go lucky, light, flying personalities. You function, you manage, you pass your day, you do your job, you manage to go with society. But deeply, you don't look at anything. I hate to use the word "superficial people". You are not superficial people. You are all serious, but there are a lot of "you" there too. [laughs]. Honestly. The problem is that somehow you didn't mature out of the a priori level. On top of that, education, language, sophistication of society and so forth just push you out and you fly around. Perhaps we can make some judgment here, although Buddha says that no one should judge anyone, unless you have total knowledge. But when you talk person to person, you sit down half an hour with them, at the most, maybe even after 3 or 5 minutes you can guess whether that person is a light person or a deep person; whether their talks and ideas are coming only from the net of information and experience - like a hammock. That is my vision. You draw everything from there, you don't penetrate beyond that. These are the people we call light people. It is not a questiof of being nice or not nice. On both levels you find nice and not so nice people. But it is a difference between light and deep persons.

Audience: Shallow and deep?

Rimpoche: Okay, shallow. I can't be that shallow then, because of my big, fat stomach and everything else. That is lucky for me. If I go on the weighing machine it will show over 230 pounds. That is not shallow.

Again, notice that I am not using the term "primordial state", but "a priori state". I hope you notice that. There is a hell of difference between these two. Anyway, when we just look up to the information-experience net, it is more than an answer to that person, but rather usage. Whatever pops up is used. From the usage point of view, it is almost an identification for that individual. You look at that information net, find it, get in touch with it and go back to it. It is becoming almost an identity for the individual. So naturally, that is wrong. You are not information, you are not experience, you are a being, for god's sake! Mind you, you are a human being. The information is maintained in the computer. The computer has all the answers from the infomation point of view - anything you want to. Wasn't it a surprise to learn in the winter retreat that there is a 'yamantaka.com' and a vajrabhairava.com'? Wasn't that shocking and unexpected? The computer, or rather, the internet, has the information. But we should be beyond that. Therefore, if you are identified as a being, there is more than that. I have heard that some people would like to have some electronic chips put into their brain and function like that. They think it is great. For me, it is pathetic. A human being has a more sophisticated mind than any electronic system. Just because we cannot use it we try to put some electronic chip inside! That is wrong. It is like the verse we just discussed: the lower ones are refuted by the higher ones.

Going beyond that, we are looking a bit further. There we have the soul. We cannot touch so much on that tonight. But still, when you look at it, what is the soul? Some people hate to call it "soul". They will say, "I have consciousness, not soul?" Whatever language you may use, in our actual mind we project an irreducible essence.

Then the question rises? What sort of essence is this? I have done a number of talks in which I labeled it as "Queen Bee" or "Queen Ant". We do have all of those. What does that do to us, this irreducible essence? Irreducible means it is very solid, it can't be reduced at all. What is the relationship between that and mind? Or is it me? We project that as "me", actually.

As I told you: we either try to bring happiness down to our identity or try to take our physical identity up to the level of happiness and somehow make a big mix of it. We like to make that solid and permanent, almost like a mix of concrete. What do you get, when you mix sand, cement and water?

Audience: And aggregates and gravel...

Rimpoche: all of that and then it becomes a soup of concrete, it is all mixed in there, shaken in that big machine and then it becomes solid. For us it is very strong and permanent. It is concrete. We forget that all that actually changes minute by minute and decays. The monuments we see in the great ancient cities, whether in the east or the west, and particular the ageing conrete structures in the east European cities are the greatest examples of decay. We try to make it very solid and permanent. We have to spend time on it and check whether that is right or wrong.

As long as we have something to hold on, we always want to hold on. I think that is the subject we are studying right now. If you keep on reading this text here it will say, "Your form is not you." That is fine, but before we get into this, what is it? The subject we have to really study is "me" and "mine". What is this? This is what we have to find out, not "who am I?" All this talk of dualism and delusions, of relying on something unreliable, believing a lie and not the facts, all these statements after statements, are based on the reality of perceiving what is "me" and what is "mine". Ultimately, when we get wisdom it will be the wisdom of self and the wisdom of phenomena other than self, articles, belongings, etc.

Emptiness, selflessness, is divided into two:

selflessness of self or person

selflessness of phenomena other than self - that includes other beings as well

In order to clearly understand this we need to know "me" and "mine". All these projections I talked to you about, the a priori state of the person and the information-fed-and-knitted into experience-person, penetrating through this net of information and not penetrating, and beyond that, what is soul, consciousness and so on, since we are looking inside ourselves, this is vipasyana. Finding out what is "me" is the question on which we are stuck.

It is better to be stuck at this point now in March than still being stuck in November. I looked at both, Thursdays and Tuesdays and how difficult the subject is. Actually, two years ago in the Beacon Theatre, in New York, His Holiness the Dalai Lama gave a lecture series about the very foundation of this issue. Everybody who spent time with him there said that it was hard to understand and hard to get. But it is the foundation of all this. To really have wisdom of selflessness, first you have to recognize this and get it. Then I will try to introduce subject by subject. Looking at the depth and amount of material I would be kidding myself if I thought I could complete it all this year, just by doing the Tuesdays and Thursdays. No way, it is going to go into 2006. But by March 2006 we can't still be stuck on this point. If we remain stuck here we will be stuck forever. Right now it is okay to be stuck.

I would be happy to open it up to you if you have any burning questions or are dying for making a statement.

Questions and Answers:

Audience: If I understand my own perception of the world, there are thousands of things that help make who I am and contribute to that, whether there are spiritual beings or substantial matter. I am intrigued by the idea of the essence and whether that is the Queen Bee or Queen Ant, the last resort to "me" holding out? And then there is the relationship to the mind? Is the mind the consort, just a plaything of the essence? I perceive there is a self that is intimately connected to everything that lives. I also perceive that there is no-self and a total emptiness witnessing. I am wondering if the Dharma is the awakening mind, the relationship between everything that lives, incredible compassion, love and intimacty, along with the incredible freedom from oneself, which actually isn't the self.

I remember that Trungpa taught the levels 101, 102, 103. And at 101 there is no self, no one is coming to save you. The students were going crazy and he said maybe at 102, 103 we can talk about something else but at 101 there is no self, no one is coming to save you and if you can hold that position for a while, maybe we can do some work here.

I am wondering, between the emptiness and fullness of the heart, between the intimacy, whether you are a misfit of a mystic or romantic, artist or spiritual communion guy - like I am and on the other hand there is this emptiness and selflessness, where you completely get rid of yourself. Is the dharma the mind that arises between the emptiness of our heart and the fullness of life? Isn't it true that there has to be a trinity in that Buddha, Dharma, Sangha thing? The Sangha is the relationship with everything that lives.

Rimpoche: Very well said. I can't answer that, because I couldn't hear very well. All the microphones are going that way, I only hear echo. Anyway, what I did hear was well said. I wouldnt say that dharma is between mind and emptiness, though.

Audience: The dharma is the mind that arises in the relationship between everything and nothing, the intimacy of all life and the communion of love and compassion, the loving relationship to our life, where we are brothers and sisters and kindred souls or kindred somethings to all life. Also the fact that we are free of ourselves and can be just for a second silent enough to see what is going on. There is a mind that arises that is pure relationship. I think that might be part of the Song of the Dharma. I don't know if Jack Keruac would say that, but I am wondering about it.

Rimpoche: Again, well said. Any other questions?

Audience: When you were talking about the hammock of knowledge of one way to experience oneself....

Rimpoche: I was just using the word "hammock" as metaphor for the net of information. The information net is holding the individual.

Audience: Right, and you also used words like 'shallow' and 'superficial'. Basically, an aspect of limit is what is brought forward here.

Rimpoche: I don't get it.

Audience: Anyhow, given the place you were referring to and given the topic of deepening, is that deepening meant to be able to access the a priori state?

Rimpoche: Whatever is coming out of the a priori.

Audience: As we are focussing the attention of the mind onto the lack of inherent existence itself, are fear and panic emotions that tend to rise up?

Rimpoche: Ho ho, very good question. You know, last year, during the teachings on meditation, at the third stage it says that you will notice much more and you may think [that the reaction you perceive] is rising from [doing] the meditation, but in reality there is not something new or something more arising, but we are just noticing what is there [in the first place]. I believe that is what it is. Besides that, these very words you used seem to be contradictory: emptiness and rising emotional fears. Don't take the answer that is coming personal. Actually, when you have these fearful emotions rising, you are not focusing on emptiness at all. Empty means empty of the fear/confusion-oriented ego. [Right now] you are throwing a long distance stone at the so-called emptiness, trying to catch it. You are not really focusing on emptiness.

Audience: Isn't it too soon to consider the self as object of negation?

Rimpoche: You may be right, and that's why I am moving forward really slowly, but I don't think it is too soon. If you look amongst yourselves, a number of you have been doing these things now for 15-20 years and if that's too soon, then that is a little bit of a problem. I think it is about time to look into this [laughs].

Audience: Last week you said and I refer to the transcript: "The ordinary person does not make a separation between what they hear, see, understand and then experience." We have all these things clumped together. When we don't separate the perception from the action of perceiving we have some problems sorting out what is going on. Can you talk a little more about the activity of perception prior to the cognition of what it is?

Rimpoche: A lump? I know what you are talking about. My point last week in that talk was this: Number One, our seeing and experiencing is like a lump. Again, it is almost like the a priori level. Then two: we do not realize the separation between what we see and what it is. What we see and what it is - seeing or not seeing that is where the division between the ordinary and the contemplative is made. I vaguely remember that is what I was talking about. Besides, there is a debate on that point between the ordinary and the contemplative person: it is the understanding point. At the ordinary level, unfortunately we believe what we see and understand. At the contemplative level we don't buy what we see and still go deeper and see it. That was the point.

Audience: Is the perceptive ability more closely related to the a priori state of mind?

Rimpoche: No, I think that level is even more primitive. I think they call it pre-knowledge level. It is more primitive even than that level. That's why I was making sure that we are not confusing that with the primordial level. I guess that's it. Lets stop, otherwise this discussion will continue.

I have something to share with you: Birgit Roller, our good friend and a very nice person, had some difficulties with the immgration. Unfortunately she has no more than 3 weeks to sort out her immigration paper work. Her immigration will be probably be re-considered if she has a position in her field of expertise, which is public relations. My request to all of you is: if you know something or someone who can offer help to Birgit on that, please speak to her. She is available at: 248 459 2959 and she also has e mail: birgitroller@sbcglobal.net. That will be great sangha help. You may not have it yourself but if you know somebody, that would also be a great help. It would be really appreciated, wherever you are, in the United States.

20050322GRAABODHI9

Thank you and welcome to tonight. I am still stuck at the 4th verse of the wisdom chapter. I am stuck between the 4th and 5th verse. For you it looks like I have gone on, but I am really stuck here. Let me re-read those verses:

Verse 4

Due to the difference in their intelligence, even contemplatives are refuted by successively higher ones by means of analogies accepted by both parties, regardless of what they aim to prove.

Verse 5

Ordinary people see and imagine things as real and not illusory. It is in this respect that there is disagreement between the contemplative and ordinary beings. Even the objects of direct perception, such as form and the like, are established by consensus and not by verifying cognition. That consensus is false as is the general agreement that pure things are impure.

Verse 6

Even the objects of direct perception, such as form and the like, are established by consensus and not by verifying cognition. That consensus is false as is the general agreement that pure things are impure, for example.

Somehow we can't get out of verse 4:. even contemplatives are refuted by successively higher ones. The reason why I can't get out of that is that perhaps that part is one of the most difficult of the early stages of dealing with wisdom. As you always hear and we always say: every knowledge is wisdom. But here we are talking about a very specific wisdom. This is vipasyana. I do not know what different translation of this people have, but often it is called insight meditation. There is an institute named Insight Meditation Center. That is in Massachusetts where Joseph Goldstein and all these people teach. Similarly, in California, there is Spirit Rock, where Jack Kornfield teaches. All of those talk about insight. vipasyana means really looking in. And we all know that it doesn't mean to check whether we have all the internal organs in place. Definitely not. That is a different type of looking inside. The question really is: What is it that is functioning? Who is the person that experiences joy, suffering and neutral states of life? Who is the person that is coming from the previous life, living here and going into the future? Who is the person that earlier the Buddhist called "selfless"? What are they talking about? That is still the question. We still don't know yet. That is why we are still lingering on this point. The other day we mentioned the "irreducible essence". What does that mean? In normal American life we talk about the soul. Some people say, "I have no soul, but I have consciousness." What is the difference? Somehow that becomes our concern. We talk about emptiness and selflessness. The words are just words. Somehow we have to get something. Before we know something that is -less of something, we have to know what it is. [self-less, so what is that self]. Take the irreducible essence. So there is something to look in. Then there is another point, which is quite known, and that it the indivisible thing. Is there such a thing as indivisible?

These are the big questions we have to settle within ourselves. As far as I am concerned, I know nothing that is indivisible. In my opinion, honestly, without thinking from any religious background, if you just think logically, there cannot be anything that is indivisible. You may say, sure, the tiniest possible particle will be indivisible. But let me bring one logical point here for your consideration:

Anything that exists, whether it is consciousness or mind or physical, will occupy space and time.

Lets begin with physical substance. Anything you might take, put it on the table and see what happens: it takes up space, doesn't it? I am putting this pen in front of me on the desk. It takes up space. Likewise, anything else, no matter how subtle, it takes up space. The moment it takes up space, the space is divided into directions. The object will have an eastern, western, southern and northern side and an upper side and a lower side. Plus you will have the corner sides. So it is divisible. If you can show me any physical object that doesn't divide the space into the directions, you could claim there is indivisibility. But no human being, scientist or non-scientist, spiritual or non-spiritual, contemplative or ordinary, can ever show it. It has never been shown and will never be shown, because that is space. Therefore, there is no indivisible physical thing.

Then you may say, "What about mind, something non-physical?" This is divided by time: now, before and next time. Just like the directions divide space, time divides mind. Thus, to me, anything indivisible does not exist. I respect all the great scientists. But I had always difficulties with Stephen Hawkins' claim that there is an end to the Russian doll. Remember, he made that speech, when Clinton was in the White House, in his Christmas lecture there. He concluded his lecture, "Mr. President, Mrs. Clinton, there will be an end to the Russian doll." I always had difficulties with that. I was told that he has changed his mind now. I am so happy with it.

Actually, it is not a question of being happy or not, but if you just keep on thinking, that is what comes up. This is Buddha's wisdom of interdependent nature is based on, totally. Everything depends on each other.

The fundamental question still remains. I used the issue of indivisibility, because that is commonly discussed in the west. It is very familiar. Just bring your finger in front of you. It will cut into space. There is nothing illogical in this, there is no mystery here. Maybe I am naïve, but that is what I see. Just like space is divided by directions, mind is divided by time.

You can never say that yesterday's mind is today's mind - unless you are crazy. It is interlocked with time. Time passes, it doesn't just stand still. Then, I have the possibility to escape from the cocoon, the indivisible, irreducible essence. You know the cocoons? That is where the silk worms go and hide. Yeah, I came up with the terminology of putting 'irreducible' and 'essence' together. But is there an irreducible essence? Is there something irreducible? Yes. Is there an essence? Yes. But is there an irreducible essence? You have to think about it.

From the Buddhist text point of view, Nagarjuna's view has been divided into two categories or theoretical interpretations by Lo bön Leg den je (Skt: Bhavaviveka). Out of those, almost all Tibetan philosophical schools will accept the viewpoint of Buddhapalita and Chandrakirti. That has a lot to do with the idea of jig ta. That term is made up out of two words: jig refers to something that doesn't last, something that goes away or is destroyed. ta is view, looking, holding. In straight forward language, you are holding on to something that is going to go. Let me say it this way: jig ta - these two words give us subject and object. The subject is the self, the one who is looking. And the object is what you are looking at. I am not sure whether there is a self separate from another thing or not, but in jig ta, it is one who depends on something that is by nature perishable. We are hanging on to something that is perishable.

In this case, the perishable thing we are hanging on is our own form, our skandhas. If you spell out jig ta it becomes jig tso la ta wa. That refers to someone who is holding on to something that is going to go away, something perishable. In this case then, the subject is the self and the object is the perishable aggregates. The self is trying to hold on. It has that idea, it is looking that way. That is it's "view", as it is traditionally referred to in Buddhists text.

A view is something that you see, isn't it? In the resort brochures it always tells you, "Hotel River View", "Hotel Mountain View". This is trying to tell you that from that hotel you will see the river or the mountain. Some crazy brochures will tell you, "River View Road", meaning that you actually don’t see the river from the hotel but you have to take the road up and then you will see the river.

Audience: Hotel Wrong View!

Rimpoche: [laughs] that is right: Wrong View Hotel. Anyway, that is the idea of the view. So that view focuses on the perishable skandhas as its object. That is like the perishable skandhas. So that is the time when you have got to worry about it. And they are getting much more yellow now and losing water. It is the time before they become yucky stuff. That is what happens; that is what being perishable is all about.

The skandhas are the object, you are the subject. In Tibetan it is called yül and yül chen [lit: object and object-possessor]. yül is the object you are looking at and yüul chen is the mind that is observing. I think you can call that subject and object.

When you are looking at the perishable aggregates and take that as your identity, you automatically have to worry about protecting and promoting and preserving it. That is why we have this fear always with us. Like it or not, whatever we do and wherever we are, we have this terrible fear of losing. We identify with, cherish and hold these yellow, perishing vegetables - five of them! Five broccolis! Honestly. Until this is clear with us I can't go on with verse 4 and 5. Remember, in your everyday life, when the fear comes. This is a different fear than when you walk around in downtown Harlem and are afraid that some crazy guy is going to hit you on the heard. I am not talking about that. I am talking about some fear that twists you from inside and worries you and almost paralyzes you. If that terrifying fear rises within you, remember, you are looking at 5 perishable zucchinis. Maybe there is a carrot in there too. I am joking, but that will help you remember. Tell yourself: I am not going to hang on to these 5 yellow pieces of broccoli. I am going to let it go. That should release you. Not completely, but quite a lot, from this fear that is crushing you, the fear that is trying to grab you like lions' claws or dragons' claws. Remember: "Hey, this is just perishable broccoli. There is nothing to hold." So the fear will have nothing to hold. It will come and go around and then go away. I mean, it won't go away immediately. It will hang around and dance around and do a little bit of mumbo jumbo, but there is nothing to hang on to.

That is not emptiness, but it gives you some idea, some sense of what emptiness will do for us. That is why it is so important. These are the early sparks of the real emptiness-wisdom that will come later. Another query could be this one:

"All right, you say it is empty, nothing lasts. Why should I put my energy into trying to develop generosity, morality and so on? Why should I do it? You said there is nothing. There is nothing called good and nothing called bad. We are what we are. We are what we see. If we don't see it, it is not there. There is nothing. Therefore, do whatever you want to do. Who cares? Forget about morality. You want to get angry? Go ahead, get angry. You want to develop hatred? Go ahead and do it. You want to be obsessed? Go ahead. You want to kill? Go ahead and kill. You want to save somebody? Go ahead and save. There is nothing beyond what we can see."

For me - for us - we would be happy to go with this. It is for you to think about it. There would be nothing beyond what you can see. Not so many sensible persons would think that way. If you look carefully within yourself, there are a lot of contradicting thoughts. Your own personal experience will tell you that it is not true that there is nothing beyond what you can see. Whether your experiences are right or wrong is a different matter, but your personal experience will tell you that it can't be right. Further, a great many spiritual teachers, including Buddha, will tell you it is not true. Am I going to hold that view without any valid reason? The only reason we have is: "That's it, because I can't see it. No one can show me. No one has shown me, no one will show me. I see nothing and that's it." We don't have any more reasons than that at all.

With this almost invalid reason we let ourselves go against all the statements of the great masters and against our own experiences. Are we willing to do that? That is the question, very simple. Probably not. Why? Because we are educated and intelligent. True, you are educated and intelligent. We are all not naïve, me included. So we understand: this is an invalid, unreliable reason that we are hanging on to. Our own personal experience even contradicts it. There are so many things that we cannot see that turn out to be true, scientifically and otherwise. We always discover many more things.

How many times we have changed our mind about the egg alone? Egg is good for you, egg is bad for you, egg is good for you, egg is bad for you - how many times? A few years ago a study came out that says, "If you eat apples, you will get cancer". A little later, another study came out that said, "You should eat so many apples per day" and so on. That shows you that just because you don't see it, it is not there. That is not a valid reason, like in the case of the egg. Unless we are fools we will not accept it.

Another thought is: the independent self. It says there is such a self that has nothing to do with the mind, nothing to do with the physical body. Then again some earlier teachers said: The self or soul is the physical form. But if the form is the soul, then since the physical form rises, increases and then decreases, the soul also has to rise, increase and decrease. Likewise, there are five skandhas. So there should be five souls inside the same person. That is what we call "split personality". These kinds of thoughts are what "looking inside" really means. It is not checking whether you have a chest, lungs, heart, stomach, intestines and so forth, if you keep going down. That is not looking inside. That is the simple reason why I can't move on.

The most important point I have to raise is this: If it is not there, if it is empty, why should I suffer and take hardship in trying to become enlightened? It is not there.

When you look inside, into the logical points you have to look from both angles. You look from this side and from the other side and see what is wrong and explain it, think about it, collect more information. Then you meditate and get experience. It does not come without that process. Otherwise, everybody would easily understand emptiness. But we don't. The word emptiness doesn't mean emptiness. The word wisdom doesn't mean wisdom. The word enlightenment doesn’t mean enlightenment. Enlightenment is the result of wisdom.

Some Thursdays ago we raised the question: Why are you doing a spiritual practice? What do you hope to gain out of it? We said, "My goal is enlightenment, the mind level of dharmakaya. How do we get there? By knowing this wisdom. Whatever we understand about emptiness, by meditating on that it will become better and better and finally the no more learning situation will come and we will be enlightened. It is easy to say that the lower view is defeated by the higher views. But we haven't answered the question, "Why do we struggle if after all that, everything is empty?" In absolute reality it is empty. Absolutely speaking, there is no enlightenment, because it is empty. On this ground I have been saying,

If you exist relatively, it is good enough to be existing.

If you do not exist absolutely it is not good enough not to be existing.

I have been twisting my tongue telling you that for the last ten years. That is the reason why. That is the reason why we have two truths, not one truth. So the answer is: to say that in absolute truth there is no enlightenment, nothing exists, is not good enough.

Our view is tricky. According to Chandrakirti, when we look at ourselves we are like people who have difficulties with their eyes. We don't see clearly, it is not well focused, like seeing double instead of one. It is unfocused vision. Through an unfocused camera, you see two noses and faces and so on. Another traditional example is that some people will see hairs dripping down, although that is not really happening. This is an example to show that what we see is unreliable. In other words it is filtered, unfocused vision. Many people talk about dualistic vision. I believe that's what it is. We see an irreducible self, although it is not there. That is the dualistic point. Perhaps wisdom tells you that's not it. Look more. I don't want to draw a conclusion. Look more.

Many of you might have read Pabongka's Liberation in the Palm of your Hand.. He has the example of looking for an elephant in your house. In one room you see a pig, in another a donkey, then a horse and so on. You find the pig, take it out. You find the horse, take it out. You find the donkey and take it out. You have to go through every possibility your mind suggests. So you have to look at Miss Piggy and realize, "That's Miss Piggy. That's not my elephant".

And remember the "perishable vegetables". That should give you an immediate result to protect yourself from fears. Are there any questions?

Audience: There is part of me that is always watching, including in dreams. During my whole life there is someone that never speaks but always watches the whole of my life. Who is that watcher? Is that an irreducible thing? Who is the one that keeps looking again, even though there are gaps? Can you say something about those gaps? Blavatsky, in the late 1800s, said that if you can perceive something it is materialistic and perishable. I wonder who is the witness? Is that the door to the indissolvable drop?

Rimpoche: Can I tease you? Okay, you don't mind - do you really have somebody there who doesn't speak but just listens and watches? Just joking.

Audience: No, everybody in my life is a big talker.

Rimpoche: See, that's it. And what you said is the perfect dualistic view: watch the watcher.

Audience: And then you melt into the watcher…..

Rimpoche: That is a different step, you are now taking a step ahead. Merging into oneness is taking a step ahead. Don't go there yet. Ultimately that is where we want to go, but not yet. I don't know whether this "watcher" is something that hardly speaks and whether it is inside or outside. I was talking the other day and used the term a priori and primordial mind. This is exactly what Changya Rolpai Dorje said in his poem about the Great Mother. He said

When you are looking at the face of the Great Mother you see lumps and wrinkles. But there are no lumps or wrinkles in her face. If you are not careful the Mother is going to run away.

Like that, we are coming up with names like a priori, primordial mind, irreducible essence, indivisible essence and so on. All of those are like lumps on the face of the Mother.

Yes, and anything we look at is perishable, but we never realize that. We think it is great, wonderful and fantastic and our mind will make it a little more - until we begin to hate it. The moment we begin to hate it, it all becomes horrible, over night. It is like in the movie Shangri-la. The moment you cross the steps out of there it suddenly goes zoooop, all the air goes out of the hot balloon. I guess that's what it is.

Audience: You talked about space and about consciousness being divisible by time.

Rimpoche: Yes, time divides consciousness.

Audience: Isn't that perception an artificial construction of our limitation of our present state of awareness?

Rimpoche: No, I think time is real, isn't it? Relatively speaking.

Audience: But not absolutely…

Rimpoche: This is what I said before: If you do not exist absolutely it is not good enough not to be existing. That's it.

Audience: In trying to live and function in this world there is a certain amount of self protection and self awareness that I need. Now you are saying that the self that I am trying to protect is not there and is a perishable old zucchini. I have to think a lot more about this, but how can you function in the world without becoming a door mat and still see things this way?

Rimpoche: If someone steps on a vegetable that has already perished they get all the yucky juices thrown at them. Even then there is no need to be a door mat. That’s your answer.

Audience: You mentioned it is possible to give up the jig lta, giving up the illusion of permanence. You said that at that moment fear could arise….

Rimpoche: I didn't say that. I said that this will actually stop the fear. STOP.

Audience: All I feel is the fear though….

Rimpoche: Get that STOP sign. And instead of S-T-O-P, make it J-I-G-T-A. Honestly, that is what you do. That will change your mind, change your view.

Thank you so much

PS: I have some more information about the Buddha Statue Project for Losseling. The estimated cost was $100,000 but thanks to the dollar going down and the rupee up, thanks to Mr. Greenspan or Mr. Bush, the cost is now $110,000. We have been able to raise $80,000 so far. That is great, but we have a little more to go. Whatever you can still raise, no matter how much or little it may be would be most helpful.

Then, this Friday a group of Loseling monks are traveling in Michigan and are stopping over here in Ann Arbor. We are asking them to do some pujas. In the morning they are doing the 4 sets of mandala offering to Tara. It has four mandala offerings, four sets of praises, 3 or 7 repetitions of the 21 Tara Praise and that is what they will do in the morning. In the afternoon they will do the general protector prayers like Mahakala, etc. In the evening there will be lama chopa. You are welcome to drop in any time during the day and you can participate in the evening with the lama chopa. There is opportunity to make donations to them. In Tibet the system is to feed them during the prayers and pay them afterwards. That is the work they do. Just like we get paid for doing 8 hours of work - that is what they do.

Further, I understand that the programs we are doing in Jewel Heart are doing great and are helpful to people, especially the Sunday ones. They are going well, a lot of new people are there and they would like to find out and talk to somebody. After Easter Sunday where we are not having a talk, the next Sunday I will be here to speak at 10 am. So, I would like to make a strong request to those who have been around Jewel Heart for a while, who had experience with the practice and how that works in your life. If there is only one or two experienced people available to talk to the new people it is not enough. They are lined up, so if you could come and join a little more and have conversation it would help. That is true dharma service to the new people. Here is your opportunity to be a practitioner, dharma guide, to be generous. Please take advantage of that.

20050329GRAABODHI9

Thank you and welcome tonight. I have been talking to you people about verse 5 for the longest time.

Verse 5

Ordinary people see and imagine things as real and not illusory.

It is in this respect that there is disagreement between the contemplative and the ordinary people.

I talked quite in detail about this and how we perceive reality. The truth is: when we talk about wisdom, we are talking about reality. In other words, we are looking beyond the mystery of life. We try to cut through that, whatever it is, and try to see what is. The true wisdom is going beyond the mystery of life. The mystery of life is all our excitement, sadness and all of that. Also not knowing. That is part of the influence of the mystery of life. When I say that the wisdom is trying to dig down and go beyond that, cutting through the sources of mystery is cutting through the object of negation, from the philosophical language point of view. We have to go beyond the object of negation. That is the wisdom we are talking about. Looking at the object of negation that is where the point of difference lies between the contemplative and the ordinary ones. Verse 5 was all about that.

I did give you a lot of points to think about this. I can't do everything here, but I did give you quite a lot. We talked about the possibility of an indivisible object. We talked about irreducible essence. Those of you who attended the last few classes will know about it. Those who just come in today for the first time, I am sorry, you might get a little confused and not know what I am talking about. But it is an ongoing thing. It links up. The wisdom we are talking about is the wisdom that goes beyond the mystery of life. We just see what it is. The essence could be the indivisible thing or irreducible essence or some people say it is an independent existence. Some people say that the self is the body. Some people say the "me" is the mind. Some say that it is the combination of body and mind. To talk in terms of the object of negation is talking from one angle, the very philosophical angle. But before we see what it is we have to see what it is not. This is a funny way how Buddha guides us on the wisdom level.

There is no point in Buddha just telling us what it is. You will say, "All right, that's what it is. Buddha said so." There is no wisdom about that. Lord Buddha has spoken and that's about it. That doesn't become wisdom at all. In order to become wisdom the individual person really needs to know what it is really is. One has to look and think and analyze. At least you have to say, "I am doing things. I am coming and I am going, I am sitting. So who is that?" Very simple. That is the ordinary "I". We had a term the other day: the a priori "I". Are we talking about the a priori I or the ”I" that we think is the person? The simple, ordinary, a priori I is not the subject of discussion at all. The subject of discussion is "I the big one", the "I" who hates and is so sensitive, who cannot tolerate anything, who is the dictator, the queen bee, the queen ant. We are looking at that to find out: what is it? It is the mystery of life there. Until that is solved no one gets through, whether you are a thinker, not a thinker or whatever you do, you will not get through, whether you are Buddhist, Judeo-Christian, atheist or whatever you maybe, you will never go through.

That is why these days a lot of scientists are turning to this. Only last Thursday I was talking with Ben Shapiro. He told me, 'I am very interested in Buddhism because of this wisdom. I have great difficulty with the compassion because you treat everybody as the same and that is extremely difficult. The wisdom is no problem for whatsoever, because my scientific background confirms every point you are making." A lot of scientists are looking into this, studying it and spending a tremendous amount of time and energy and money. They think they will come out with something to solve the mystery of the life of human beings through scientific means in connection with looking at these ancient sources. Call it religion, philosophy, way of life or experience, it is what Buddha shared with us.

Recently I was at a conference with this artificial intelligence guy (Ray Kurtzweil) and he said the very same thing. He said, "What Mr. Gehlek is presenting here are very ancient religious points. Science had rejected these ideas and followed the facts and figures, while religion follows faith. That is where the road divided. Now science is making a 180 degrees turn. The facts have forced us to follow the insights of the ancient wisdom."

To me, truth and reality are one, whether you look at it through the scientific or through the religion's methods. It doesn't matter. That is one of the reasons why I don't buy blind faith. I do buy faith, but it has to be intelligent faith. In other words, if Buddha came and told me, "If you don't worship me, you will go to hell" I will say, "Thank you Buddha, I will go to hell then." That’s how it really is. Where is this hell and what is it? They tell you there are 18 different holes or something and I don't think it is golf!

But the point is that the essence of Buddhism is wisdom and compassion. Compassion without wisdom is blind. Wisdom without compassion makes you a soul-less person. So both are necessary. The essence of the wisdom really looks for why we get it wrong all the time, why we are in trouble all the time. First we look outside and think that somebody has provided all this for us. But that doesn't make sense. If somebody created our life why didn't they make a good one? Honestly. Why did they make all these manufacturer's defects? When there are manufacturer’s defects in a product we will return it. Even today we are returning the Ford Explorer because of manufacturer’s defects. We reject and return it. But in this case it is not. If it was an external creation we could change it. But it is not, it is internal. Ancient thinkers, irrespective of whether they were Hindus or Buddhists, came up with the idea of the indivisible, or the irreducible essence, independent existence, along with the physical skandhas. Then there is the idea of independent existence combined with mental experience, nothing physical.

Each and every one of those point though has faults. As we said the other day, an indivisible thing is not even possible. The moment you bring anything physical into space, this space is divided. The object occupies space. So it has eastern, western, southern and northern sides. Therefore there is division. In case of the mind there is division by time: yesterday's mind, today's mind, tomorrow's mind. So the indivisible is never possible. Neither is the irreducible essence. That is a very similar idea.

When you don't think carefully, the result will be something funny. There was a very well-known Tibetan minister once. He has no spiritual knowledge for whatsoever. He became governor of Chamdo, in Eastern Tibet. There he was visited by a local warlord type of chieftain of a certain caste. Eastern Tibet had a very similar culture to the native American culture. So this chieftain called on the new governor. They didn't really know what to talk about. So the chieftain asked, 'What are the so-called Three Jewels?" The governor was able to answer that one: Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. The chieftain said, "Oh I see. So where are they these days?" Now the minister had no idea where Buddha, Dharma and Sangha were. He was eating and took his time chewing his food. Then he came up with an answer. He said, "They are living somewhere up there in the invisible sky, in a wonderfully radiating, crystal glass-framed altar." He had no answer, so he came up with that statement. The chieftain had nothing to say to that, so he managed to pass through the conversation. But it is totally nothing - it is not poetry, just made up something.

So when you don't really know about how things exist and you use your intelligence you will come up with all these interesting answers, like indivisible, irreducible essence and another one is that the self should be oneness with the form, or with the skandhas. The answer is: If it is one with the skandhas, look how many skandhas you have: five, all these eyes, ears, nose, tongue and body. So there has to be five "I"s as well. If you say, "Okay, the self is the combination of all these five together", then the answer is: If that is so then a deaf person will have no soul." There is something from the combination missing. You don't hear anything, there is no sound. If you are blind you won't see any form. That is very similar. All these direct contradictions will come up. When you clear each and every one of them you are gaining insight.

I don't want to sit on the verse 5 all the time. I am going to read a statement from a commentary. We have some kind of dualistic perception. We actually perceive something beyond the combination of "I and what belongs to me", as the lam rim chen mo translation says. You can also say "I" and "my". In any case, I and my perception or projection will have confused points. That is our problem. It is dualistic perception. Dualistic means double vision, doesn't it? I don't know English very well. You have to remember that this is a language that I picked up in the street and from the television and not so much from Sesame Street but more so from Days of Our Lives.

The traditional teachers give the example of the magician. I don't know whether the ancient magicians and today's magicians work the same way. I have no idea what today's magicians do. The old magicians used to just bring a little pebble or some part of a flower and then they used two powers, either material power or mantra power. That will cause you to see the little pebbles as horses or elephants or horse carts or anything they would like to project and show you.

At that moment, those of us who are watching the magician's show will see elephants, horses, rabbits and we will also think that that there is real elephants, horses and rabbits. But the magician him/herself will see horses, rabbits and elephants and so on, but knows very well that there are not horses, elephants, etc, but just little pebbles or flowers.

Even today when the magicians take out a rabbit from the hat, they don't create a rabbit. It's a trick. A magician that came here some time ago used to produce a flower in the air, but actually he took it out of the sleeves of his coat. When we don't see the flower in the sleeve and the magician suddenly makes the flower appear in the air we think that he produced it out of thin air, like Sai Baba, who produces ashes in the air. But in the magician's view, through his personal knowledge he of course knows that he brought the flower in his coat sleeves and pulled it out from there.

So there are two different views looking at the same flower: one thinks that it came out of the air, out of nowhere, the other knows it came out of the coat sleeve. One flower, two different consciousnesses, two different understandings.

Just like that it is when different people consider "I" and "my". The contemplative sees that it is not reality but appears as if it is reality. Those of us who don't know that will think it exists as it appears. When we get mixed up we see it mixed up. When we know what is right we see it right.

If you think, "Yes, I see a pebble is being manifested to appear as a horse. I see a horse but it is not a true horse', that is because you know it is a magician's show. You have two minds here. The perceiving mind that sees the horse and the knowledge that there is no real horse there. When you can make that division you don't have so much confusion.

However, in our ordinary, normal mind, when we look at a form, we will believe that to be real. The base on which we make our analysis is the magician's horse. What we negate is the true existence of that horse. That is clear, isn't it? On the basis of the appearing horse from the magician's show we negate or reject the idea of perceiving that as a true horse. Your mind is negating the existence of a true horse based on the magician-produced horse. Again, the magician-produced horse is the base and what you negate is a true horse. What you perceive in either case is a horse. Until you know it is a magician's show you will not know that there is no truth in that horse. Until then you cannot make the distinction.

Likewise, until we see the self, the "I", the dictator, the creator, we won't know that it doesn't truly exist. It is simply the combination of a lot of things. If you take them out, nothing really exists. Until you see this you will not lose the dualistic perception. We won't know that this "I" is not there. The hope is that you will find the true existence of the individual, find out what the individual really is. That is why we go through all these different possibilities. We say that such a self would have to be one with the mind or one with the body. By considering that you will see all the faults of each possibility.

It is like looking for an elephant in a house. You have to assume that there might be an elephant in the house, so you are looking for it. In one room you see a pig, in another a goat, a horse and so on. You take the pig, the goat and the horse out and if there is really an elephant there you should be able to find it. When you see that there is no elephant there you gain the understanding of the lack of existence of the elephant. Just like that, when you look deeply within you, you will see the lack of true existence of self. Yet, it is functioning.

Don't be afraid of annihilation, because you function perfectly. The ordinary "I", which has come from a previous life and is going to a future life, the "I" what enjoys life and suffers and so on, is not shaken. What you are really negating, is the projected, ego-confusion-ignorance-fear combination - that big thing. That has to be negated. By doing that you are pulling the carpet out from under your mind. That is a very important point where you are protecting yourself from negative emotions and particularly, from fear. Other negative emotions, like obsession and hatred, are the direct result of this. When you pull that out there will be no more little symptoms left, because you truly see it. You have really busted the big lie of life. You have caught red-handed the thief that is stealing the joy from your life. I should leave it there, otherwise I will not move out of verse 5. I hope that is a good enough explanation on this point. It is very difficult for people to see that it is not there, including many of the earlier thinkers. Why are we sharing their thoughts? Because whatever had happened earlier, their thoughts and ideas are our guidance. The history is the guide for our future. Really true.

Verse 6

Even the objects of direct perception, such as form and the like,

are established by consensus and not by verifying cognition.

That consensus is false, as is the general agreement

that pure things are impure, for example.

The first line reflects one view: even the objects of direct perception, such as form and the like, are established.

This view says that what you can see directly, me and you, form, etc, is directly what it is. Form, etc, you don't have to think about it. You can directly see it, hear it, touch it, hold it, smell it. For example, if somebody asks, "Where is Jo Blo?" another person will say, "Oh, he has not shown up, but wait, there he is. That's Jo Blo." So you can look at Jo Blo's shape, you can shake his hand, you can touch his body, you can hold it. So this must be Jo Blo. With a direct mind you see it. Eye consciousness can see it, ear consciousness can hear it, nose consciousness can smell it, tongue consciousness can taste it and body consciousness can feel and touch it. Therefore, this is the essence.

Yes, that is true, relatively that is how it exists, but not absolute. If that was absolute, then there is nothing more for us to learn. Unless we are blind we will see it, unless we are deaf we will hear it. So nothing has to be learnt. Therefore, every human being, even every living being, should be a contemplative. There should not be any ordinary persons. But we know that is not the case.

This verse is interesting. The debate doesn't end there. It goes on: by consensus, not by verifying cognition

You see something and agree on it. That is consensus. Can you verify that by your cognition? No, you cannot. So the first view will say, "The form is the person." Now you ask, "Which part of the form is the person? Is the bald head or the bearded head the person?" The opponent may say, "It is the bald head." Then you counter, "So, if the hair grows on that head, is that still the same person or does it change? It should be a different person for you, because your recognition is based on the bald head." Likewise, if he says, "The person is the bearded one", then you say, "If the person shaves, does that make the person a different person? It should for you, because your cognition says the person has a beard. So when there is no beard it must be a different person." Try to prove that each one of those statements is wrong, even if it is a direct point.

The verse continues: That consensus is false – even though it is agreed to by everybody. It is false – sometimes.

I used to say: Where do we draw the line? I used to say, “If everybody is facing in one direction, it must be right.” I used to give the example of the Indian guy driving on the highway.

This Indian guy is driving on a highway in Massachusetts between Boston and New York. He is driving on the wrong side, because he is used to driving in India where they do drive on the wrong side, because over there that is the right side. He is listening to the radio and suddenly an announcement comes saying, “If you are traveling on that road, be careful. There is one person driving in the wrong direction.” So he thinks, “One person? There are hundreds of them going in the wrong direction!”

I used to give that as example for where you draw the line between right and wrong. But I was wrong on that, because all the great discoveries in science and philosophy and economy go against what is accepted. If everyone would be going in the same direction there would be nothing to be discovered. The consensus is an agreed point. That doesn’t mean that was has been agreed on is always right – just like in an election.

The verse continues: as is the general agreement that pure things are impure, for example. What does that mean? Form, etc, seem to be true. But in reality that is not true. It is a lie. Your face is not you, your body is not you. If my body is me, I should be fat, but I am not [laughs] – I am joking. An example for confusing pure and impure is our body. We think that the body is pure. Particularly medical people will tell you, “If you cut your body you will see that it is absolutely clean inside.” Buddha tells us that it is impure. That is a direct contradiction. He says it is impure because it is in nature impermanent and subject to decay. Doctors say it is clean, if the person is not sick. If the body is impure then you get sick, they say. The truth is if the body is pure, why should there be cancer? It is impure and unclean, that’s why. That is what Shantideva means. Common acceptance does not mean it is right.

Verse 7

The Protector taught things in order to bring people

to understanding.

[Qualm] If these things are not ultimately, but only conventionally,

momentary, this is inconsistent.

“Protector” here refers to Lord Buddha. This is all an exchange of ideas between different thinkers. So somebody could say, “If form, etc, is not truly existent, how can Buddha say it is impermanent? If it doesn’t even exist, the question of it being permanent or impermanent does not even arise. Therefore, your statement about true existence is wrong.” So this person is saying, this would be like claiming that an uncreated space-flower is impermanent. Where is the uncreated space-flower in the first place, even before you can talk about it being permanent or impermanent? The reply is: When Buddha shared things with people he couldn’t say everything directly. When a person first walks in you can’t tell them, “You don’t exist” If the first thing Buddha told a person would be, “You have no eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue, no body”, what would they think? So first Buddha will say, “You are impermanent. Your nose is impermanent. Your hair is impermanent. Your beauty is impermanent. Your strength is impermanent, your body is impermanent.” Buddha will lead you to understand the non-existence of things by telling you about impermanence first.

That is true for us. When we do the Odyssey to Freedom or lam rim, we will come through with impermanence first. We don’t say the moment we open the first class, “There is no eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue”. Nor do we say, “The table you see here is not really a table. It is just a top and legs. If you take the legs off you have a piece of plywood, no longer a table.”

So the Buddha is trying to lead you in the right direction. He is not telling you an untruth. Impermanence is true. Impermanence is not emptiness, but it leads you to it. Subtle impermanence is quite close to wisdom. It is momentary change. I am sitting here, you are listening. We are watching each other. Every second we change 365 times. Our mind, our body, everything is changing 365 times in the time it takes to snap your fingers. That is why our body decays after a little while. If it didn’t change continuously it wouldn’t decay that easily. We try to prevent decay and put plaster on it, paint it, then decorate it and dress it up, put it in hot and cold and worry about being cold, hot, being hungry or eating too much. So it is not easy to decay, however, it is impermanent and changes 365 per second.

Not only that, there is more. If these things are not ultimately, but only conventionally, momentary, this is inconsistent.

The idea expressed here is that impermanence is not the right thing. For example, if I see Mr. X in the morning and then again in the afternoon and evening, it is still Mr. X, no matter how he changes.

The reply is: People think and accept that everything is pure, happy, permanent and has a self. But in reality everything is impure, suffering, impermanent and has no self.

I am going to stop here. This is a long, interesting, tricky debate. It is an ancient debate between earlier great thinkers. Why are they sharing that with us? It is for us to know: this is not. If then it still exists you have to find what it is. When you can’t find it you will know that is it [self]-less. When you have found that out all your hang-overs can easily go away. There is nothing to hang over.

Anyway, for those who come here for the first time, we have been discussing this text by Shantideva for many years. We are on the wisdom chapter, the 9th, and apart from the dedication, the last chapter. So it is a little tough and difficult.

20050405GRAABODHI9

Welcome tonight. If you are here for the first time tonight you will have a little difficulty in catching up on what we are going to talk about. If you have been here continuously a couple of times, you will be able to go along with me. I would like to mention one book that might be useful to read along with this. His Holiness gave a teaching on the 9th chapter of the bodhisattvacharyavatara, and that is available. If you add that to your reading list it will be helpful. Also, those of you who are following the teachings on Thursday nights in New York, should have the book that we are following in that course. This is Tsongkhapa's lam rim chen mo, volume 3, in the English translation. If you don't have that, I can't see how you can get anything. Actually, the reason why we usually don't talk so much about wisdom is that the moment you talk about wisdom it is a very, very heavy dosage. Geshes will start on that subject 15-20 into their training. That is the subject we are dealing with.

But if you don't have the book, maybe you can xerox certain portions out of the book, a couple of pages here and there, week by week. I don't think we are going to go very fast. Last time I did two or three paragraphs and I got exhausted. Four - five pages at a time will do. We will cover at the most 8 pages in the next segment of the course.

Here, on Tues nights, what we are doing is equally hard, sometimes even harder than the lam rim chen mo part. But still, we are here, reading the verses 6, 7, 8. I would like to read up to verse 13 today.

Before I do that, I have to get you together. I am not sure whether we are together or not. The best is to work out a system of outlines. I just want to bring us up to date a little. In the beginning we focused on the two truths, absolute and relative. Out of that, the absolute truth, don dam den pa, is referring to wisdom itself - which is emptiness.

First the two truths are presented. It says that if you want to attain liberation it is necessary to understand emptiness. There are people who say that in order to get liberation you can do without emptiness. They say, "I have been a good person. I am trying to do good, I don't lose my temper. I am not a mean person, I don't have so much obsession. I have some attraction here and there, but I don't have so much obsession. I don't have hatred. I am kind and I say my mantras. I don't hurt anybody. Why won't that liberate me?" That is a very valid point. Yes, it is karma that tells us, "If you do good you will get good results. If you do bad you will get bad results." That is a true fact. So why can't that get you to liberation?

In the lam rim teachings there are a lot of hints that this it is not enough to attain liberation. For example, it is said that karma is definite, but then we also tell you, "Not every good karma will necessarily liberate you." We talk about good karma, bad karma and unshakeable karma. We also talk about samsara and nirvana. Generating good karma does not necessarily guarantee that we will be free from samsara. All these words are brought up from beginning to end, at various levels of the lam rim. You hear them all the time. It is in the Odyssey to Freedom. It is in the Three Principles of the Path. You hear it in the lam rim teachings and everywhere. It is a true fact that good karma gives good results and bad karma gives bad results. But there are many levels of "good". Every Sony watch is not necessarily the best quality Sony watch. There are some Sony watches that cost $10 and some that cost $100. There also some that cost $1000. They are all Sony. Every good karma gives good results. But what kind of good karma?

Total liberation, total freedom from samsara, cannot be attained without understanding emptiness, according to the Buddha's teachings. You may raise another question here: "It looks like you are saying that every person who is getting liberated has to be a Buddhist."

I have been trained in a debate-oriented monastery. Immediately, when I hear that only the understanding of emptiness can liberate you from samsara, I will check back, "So if a person doesn’t understand emptiness, they will not get liberated. Is that right?" The answer has to be "That is right." Then I will say, "If that is so, then none other than Buddhists can be liberated, because others don't know emptiness." And next I would follow up, "If that is true, do you state that all other traditions are false?" Now it is going to get a little extreme. I was able to gain an inch, so now I am taking a yard. The inch is there because the bodhisattvacharyavatara or any other Buddhist teaching will say that liberation depends on wisdom. Every religious tradition has its own wisdom. Even the different Buddhist schools have their own wisdom. Even the Tibetan Buddhist schools have their own wisdom. Wisdom is wisdom and everybody has their own wisdom. However, I don't know who else besides Buddhists says that emptiness is wisdom. Among the Buddhists there are also tremendous differences. From school to school, from ancient India to today's Tibet, the definition of wisdom differs. No one can say that a particular definition of wisdom is right and another definition of wisdom is wrong.

That's why even Tsongkapa's lam rim chen mo wisdom chapter sold it to us in the beginning by saying that "Yes, you are going to find a lot of definitions of emptiness by the traditional Indian masters, before Buddhism even came to Tibet as well as by other earlier Tibetan masters. But I, Tsongkhapa, follow the path of Nagarjuna, Buddhapalita and Chandrakirti."

Now, apparently every Tibetan Buddhist school, Nyingma, Sakya, Kargyu or Gelug, say that they are following Nagarjuna. I don't know what the Bon pos do. Traditionally they are not supposed to be Buddhist, but Bon, but today they like to be called Bon Buddhists. That is fine. I don't really know what they do. But all other Tibetan schools claim to be following Nagarjuna. Following and accepting Nagarjuna's views boils down to debating about what exactly is Nagarjuna's point of emptiness. That is the issue, rather than figuring out if this or that idea is wisdom. It has already been established that Nagarjuna's view is the best by quoting that almost all the early Indian masters praised Nagarjuna as the best.

Since we agreed that we are following this particular path of Nagarjuna, now we check whether certain points are right or wrong in regard to this path. On these points we can argue and debate with others. Chandrakirti has pointed out that by arguing your points, if you expose faults in other thinker's thoughts, that is okay. You can point them out. Why? He says,

By presenting your own points, if that disturbs, destroys or looks down on the points of other thinkers,

there is no fault.

This is because you don't do it in order to put them down. All you do is present your own system. In other words, there is no negativity, you don't create negative karma. On the contrary, it is positive karma, because you are bringing it out. You are not out to criticize others, but the presentation of your view may include critiques of the viewpoints of others. There is no fault in doing this. In other words, different viewpoints, thoughts and ideas are encouraged. Freedom of expression is very much emphasized - but in a framework of rules and regulations. I am sorry to have to say that but freedom of expression in this case does not mean that you can say almost every crazy thing and say, "This is my thought." You cannot do that. If you do there is no framework. There has to be a basic framework. The ground rule is: you cannot contradict direct knowledge.

One of the reasons that validate indirect knowledge is that it must not be contradicted by direct knowledge. If direct knowledge contradicts it, that proves it is wrong. The example given for this is wonderful but it may not work in the west. It used to work very well at the time I grew up in Tibet and that is because there were no automobiles. The speed may not work with this example. So Tibet is on a high plateau with wide, open plains. There are not many travelers and you can see very far.

So you see in the distance something black that seems to be moving. Actually, it is a tree stump but you think somebody is coming towards you. You keep on riding your horse in that direction and it looks more like a person and seems to be moving too. You think, "There is somebody coming. I am going to have company." You may or may not be eager to encounter the person, because it could be a robber. You may have a mix of doubt and eagerness. You go closer and closer. Suddenly you go through a little valley and up again. During that time you don't see that object any more. At that moment a person on a horse comes towards you, in bright red-pink monk colors. You know it is not the dark-colored person you are expecting. You ask him, "Oh, what happened to that dark-colored person?" The other guy says, "Which dark-colored person?" You say, "The one who has been standing back there all that time." Now the other guy says, "That one? That is a tree stump, not a person."

So, in this example the direct knowledge of the other person informs you that your mind of perceiving a dark colored person was wrong. Now you are supposed to accept that, rather than arguing, "No, you are wrong. I saw a person there and it is a person." You may even go and look for yourself and then for sure you will see that it is a wood stump. You have to be satisfied with that and accept this direct contradiction to your perception. You finally have got to accept it. You cannot continue, "There is a person. Maybe he is hiding behind the tree. Let me cut the tree down."

So that is the rule: Direct contradiction by a direct mind. It is diffusing the mystery of your thoughts with direct knowledge. So that's it. There a number of these rules. For example if you claim something is one with something else you have to agree that it is one in all aspects. Likewise, if it is separate from it, it has to be separate in all aspects. That cuts out all gray's. It is really either black or white. There is no gray. When I first came to America I was accused of having no gray, just black and white. Maybe it is because of this influence. So now I have a lot of gray.

Anyway, the wisdom of emptiness is absolutely necessary to have. There are actually three layers of "having" this wisdom.

Understanding

Comprehending

It becomes part of you

Understanding also has 3 parts. This is another thing. I was told by many of my friends I shouldn’t present like that, 2 of this and 5 of that and 4 of that. Now I am going against that. So the 3 layers of understanding are:

following learning (reading or hearing)

This is the most superficial layer

following analysis

From learning you get a picture in your head, an idea. You begin to analyze this. You disregard some things and accept others and finally you have a good idea of what it is.

following meditation

You keep that understanding gained by analyzing as base for concentration. You practice it, accept it, repeatedly do it. Then it will become part of you. Then it is no longer a foreign thing within you, but becomes your daily thoughts, ideas, chores, everyday food and thinking.

These three layers are necessary. Simple understanding will not do for spiritual practice. If you just want to be a professor with academic understanding it is enough. For that you only need the first layer and if you get to the second layer you become an expert. But to gain a spiritual insight you have to get through the third level. A lot of people will fall through that crack. They get up to layer 1, then maybe into 2, but never to the third. The third level is quite difficult. Here you are really becoming a spiritual practitioner. All of you are very devoted, but even those of us who have been involved for 60-70 years are halfway swimming and halfway sinking. That is how it really is. It is very hard.

When you say that emptiness is necessary to get liberation, that understanding itself has to go through the 3 layers. After understanding you analyze and then meditate and it will be part of you. Remember, the first point, understanding, also has 3 cycles. So it goes deeper and deeper. Take one subject from the lam rim as example. We are familiar with that. Take the precious human life.

Ask yourself the question: Is the life that I have precious? You will all say yes. But why it is precious? You may say, "It is life. What more precious than that is there?" That answer is correct but naïve. The intelligent way of answering is, "It is precious because it has capabilities with which I can do anything in this life. If I can take it, life is capable of giving everything." This answer is produced by thought. But when you go deeper inside, the thoughts don't have to come into it any more, because straight away your understanding will arise that life is precious because it gives you the opportunity, because it is capable. That insight will come from your heart, not circle around your head as an idea where you think, "Ha, it could be, let me think about it". These in between layers will be removed with deeper understanding. That is the difference in quality of understanding. You can see that by how people talk about it.

I have been talking to Jamyang yestersday. I said, "The moment somebody opens their mouth I begin to see how much they know about dharma." I am not talking about you people, but about the monks who have been practicing in the monastery for 40, 50 years. The moment they open their mouth I know how much the person knows, what sort of quality they have. The way the person puts the words will tell you exactly how much the person knows. If everything remains at the level of words and nothing is taken in, that becomes a "word flower" as we say in Tibetan. The "word flower" doesn't produce fruit. There is an equivalent expression about a person who has great experiences but no knowledge for whatsoever.

Once you have established that wisdom is necessary, the next is find out: How does one get this wisdom? Of course you get it through experience. But I told you that without the proper knowledge, I don't think the experience will be correct. That is the problem with experience. In order to get true experience you have to first learn, then pick up and then experience. There are certain schools - even Tibetan traditions - that say that they can transmit spiritual insight to you. They look at you with big, open eyes. That is happening. There are such traditions. They try to put certain thoughts in their eye consciousness and then contact another person's eye consciousness and somehow project their understanding in that. How much goes through that way, who knows. But in the Tsongkhapa tradition it is purely about knowledge which is analyzed and thereby becomes experience. This becomes internal development. That is how the steps are taken.

How does one establish the wisdom within the individual?

We all use the word emptiness. They can't just say empty, so they make it into emptiness. Another translation is suchness. With all respect to my friends, the translators, professors and contemporary Buddhist teachers, if you look at the early translations into English, they have done a great job. Today's translators say that they are unreadable, but if you look word by word they really do a great job. The ness in empti-ness has been added up later. The earlier translators used empty and suchness. The ness came in because the next translators thought that emptiness is not empty, but full and to make that clear they wanted to call it empti-ness. I actually think it creates more confusion. In Tibetan it is tong nyi - empty itself. That is wisdom, according to the Buddha. That is why the Heart Sutra says :"no eye, no ear, no nose no tongue, no teeth, no leg, no head, no horns", and so on. Empty itself - that has a meaning.

For us, when we see absolute truth and relative truth, we see two completely separate things. They seem to have nothing to with each other. If we see that, we do have a problem. Now the play with words becomes difficult, honestly.

Buddha himself has said,

ma sam joe me she rab pa rol chi

ma je man ka nam kai ngo wo nyi

That means: even if you want to say it, you can't. The words cannot express the meaning. This is what Buddha said about wisdom. He said it is like space, it is the one mother, it doesn't grow, it doesn't stop. It doesn't come and doesn't go. However, we have to explain and use words. So the best we can do is to say naturally not existing, inherently not existent.

Some thinkers will say, "If everything is naturally not existent, what the hell are you doing? Why do you work, take hardship, be kind, generous, why do you have morality and try to be patient?" They say that then the fruit of the spiritual practice, enlightenment, is also not there and it would be better to enjoy what you can, eat more, lie down, become fatter, build up more stomach. Why not? They say that does not make sense and that therefore there is no valid reason to talk about things naturally not existing. So again, they say if nothing exists inherently, then enlightenment also does not exist and then there is no point in having a spiritual practice. It is simple, I hope not too simple. Sometimes making it simple makes it sound silly.

The answer to that is: there is a valid reason to claim that things don't inherently exist. Both sides accept the existence of dreams and magician's shows [magician's illusions]. So you accept and I accept that dreams are there. They are not reality but they exist. Didn't you ever dream? Have you never seen a magician's show? So they are there. That doesn't mean that they have to be naturally real. Things could exist in the manner of your own dreams, your own magician's show. Further, although things are naturally not there, things like generosity and so on are not useless, because our mind can understand, achieve and experience. So the argument that if things are naturally non-existent it is pointless to practice spiritually has been directly contradicted by saying that you have dreams and there are magician's shows. You cannot say that your dreams don't exist. You can say, "My dream is not real", but you cannot say "My dream is not there".

The other person still objects and says: "Fire for example, is really there. You can burn yourself, you can cook food with it. That is truly existing. You have to accept that."

Now the Middle Path person will answer: "I don't accept that. You don’t need natural existence for things to function. If you exist you don't have to exist naturally. Fire is there relatively. Fire cooks and does everything, but not naturally." They tell the first person: "Since you cannot see the difference between existing and truly existing you are a fool. You need to be able to make the distinction of these two on one point."

Remember, we always say

If you don't exist absolutely it is not good enough not to exist

If you exist relatively it is good enough to exist

The moment we talk about wisdom we will tell you this. So the first person does not see this and thinks that the two truths are absolutely separate. But there is this very interesting idea: don tung gyu ma ta bu. That means: empty, lacking true existence, but existing like a magician's illusion. By telling you this I also want to give you a warning: some people may go too far and think: dreams are true reality. Some people try to live in dreams. Their dreams become their real world. That is not right. I don't mean dreams in the sense of planning and having ideas. I mean the actual dreams that happen when you fall asleep. If you try to make them the reality of your life you lose. You defeat yourself. You defeat your spiritual world and your material world. There is the common understanding that the person who is great in the spiritual field is terrible in the material world. That is not true. If one does not know how to live in the material world such a person will not know how to maintain a spiritual life. Traditional teachings emphasize this. There is a very interesting story:

There is a well-known spiritual teacher who thinks he is great. He really does become great, but maybe not at that time yet. So he is traveling through a village and has to spend the night. In Tibet there are no hotels, but some families will give you shelter. Some of them don't take money and some do. It depends on the individual how much they can leave. There are no set fees for accommodation or food. The traveler will ask for shelter and the family may give them a room, food or no food, or they may just give you a space in the courtyard. There you can build a fire and cook your own food. The family may give you food, you never know. Nothing is certain. You can't take it for granted. So this big lama with big title and big retinue came through and asked at a lady's house for shelter. The lady happens to be Tara, but looked like an old, hunch back lady, terribly dirty and she said, "You want shelter? All right, stay in the courtyard." The lama felt insulted and thought, "I am a big lama, and she won't even offer a room, just the courtyard. What an insult." It hurt his ego badly. After a little while the lady brought some tea. The Tibetan tea is normally mixed with butter and salt and shaken. It is almost like soup. But she only gave them black tea, without any butter at all, almost like dirty laundry water. So the lama felt more insulted. He looked at the tea and said, "There is not even a smell of butter here. It is not fit to drink. Therefore I throw it to your wall." With such poetry he threw the tea cup against the wall. The lady grabbed the lama by the collar and said, "You don't even have the smell of human behavior, so how can you have spiritual development? There is no room here for you. Get out of my courtyard!" And she threw him out.

Therefore if you don’t have good human cultural functioning and behavior you won't even have the smell of a spiritual path. This tells you: If you are not functioning properly in material life you won't function properly spiritually either. Therefore, if you are living in your dreams you will neither have dharma nor a material life. You will be without both. In old Tibet the teachers give this example.

Another example: There is no gas or electricity in old Tibet, not even wood in some areas. It is too dry. So they use dried cow dung to cook their food on. So the people collect the cow dung in a basket on their back. Mostly the cows are grazing on the mountain side on the other side of the river. You have to cross over, collect the cow dung and bring it back home. Some people run off without the basket. Then the saying goes: you neither have the basket at this side of the river nor do you have the cow dung at the other side of the river. So where can you look? All you can do is put the finger in your mouth."

If you live in dreams you neither have the spiritual development nor the material basis. As a consequence you can only put the finger in your mouth. That is not considered spiritual. Dream-like existence does not mean to live in dreams. Some people tell me, "I was dreaming last night about this beautiful water and I was fighting and I was enjoying". Fully awake in the afternoon, if you are still thinking that, that is what I call 'living in dreams'. That is wrong understanding. You may think that all material things are the same, whether they are there or not, because in absolute reality there is no difference. Some people even told me, "It doesn't matter if you do good or bad; in absolute reality everything is zero, because it is empty." A number of well-known, even famous people told me that. That tells you how we misunderstand. Let dream-like be dream-like but not a dream. From another angle, the whole life is a dream. At the end when the total calculation is made then it is zero zero zero zero. A number of zeroes will come. All zeroes will be there, whether it is 800 or 700 or 1000.

I wanted to read a couple of verses. These verses directly contradict that viewpoint I just told you about: If you exist you must truly exist. If you don’t truly exist you don't exist at all. This view is contradicted in verse 6:

Verse 6

Even the object of direct perception, such as form and the like,

are established by consensus and not by verifying cognition.

That consensus is false, as is the general agreement

that pure things are impure, for example.

They [people with the wrong view] are trying to tell you: Form, etc is something we directly see. It is direct understanding. It must be truly there because I can see it.

When we hear that we are sold: It is there because I saw it. That is a very strong reason. But to answer that this verse says, "You are not there because I saw you." Remember, there is one verse at the end of the Three Principles of the Path:

Further, appearance eliminates the extreme of existence.

Emptiness eliminates non-existence.

Emptiness itself is cause and effect.

Understanding this protects from these extremes.

We may say: It is there because I saw it, but what we don’t realize is that what we see is a dependent arising, not an independent object. I can only see you because you are dependently there and therefore you don't independently exist. With our knowledge of today's world, with our science and education, we know that our world is a dependently originated world. We now know that this world is not a world that is solid and independent. Therefore we, the intelligent people, understand that the old way of thinking is wrong. The old way of thinking is that we can cut off our borders, don't let people in and don't let people out and do our own thing. That no longer functions. It doesn't work. Even George Bush knows now, to a certain extent - when he wants to know. Dependently originated means that it has not originated independently. It is like somebody who is sick and depends on a walking stick. Relying on a walking stick is the sign that you cannot walk independently. It is a lack of independent capability. The walking stick is not a show piece. The British officers may have done that. They walked around with a walking stick for show and the Indians copied that. That is the sort of thing they do in India. But that is just colonial culture.

Another example is eye glasses. Why do we wear glasses? It is because without them we cannot read or see. This shows that your eyes cannot see independently. When dependence is demonstrated you know that independence is not there. If something is not there independently, it is not there truly. Therefore now you know how it works:

"You are not there because I saw you." I see a dependent person, therefore not independent, therefore not truly there.

The second half of verse 6 continues:

That consensus is false, as is the general agreement

that pure things are impure, for example.

Moreover, not only the form that you perceive but the eye consciousness with which you perceive are commonly known to exist but that is just common knowledge which is not necessarily established with a reliable reason. For example, it is commonly known that the body is absolutely clean inside but the reliable mind tells you it is dirty. It is dirty because it gets illnesses. Surgeons may tell you that when they cut a person's stomach they see that it is clean inside. To their eyes it is clean, but if it is absolutely clean, why can you get stomach cancer? If cancer can grow from inside the body it cannot be clean. That is the basic principle of Buddha. During the Four Noble Truths he talks about suffering and that the body is in nature of suffering. The anti-Buddhist thinkers say that it is clean, happy, permanent and self. Buddha counters that it is not clean, suffering, impermanent and non self. Buddha is a counter-culture person because the Hindu culture at his time would say that it is clean and permanent and so on. So Buddha turns it round, saying that it is impure, suffering, permanent and without self. Therefore they give you the example that commonly known things are not necessarily true, like for example the body being clean. The verse may say the women's body, but the same goes for every other body too. That is the reason.

There are some thinkers who then say that all relativities are not true. They say they are known but not reality. This statement is wrong. Both truths, absolute truth and relative truth, are reality. Not only are the two truths not contradicting each other, but both are true.

I was thinking of going up to verse 13 today, but it is not possible. People are shaking their heads. Don't worry, I am not going to get that far. I have to stop here.

20050412GRAABODHI9

Welcome tonight. Apparently it happens to be the last talk in this series. I have been looking and the point of wisdom is something that we consider as 'self' or "me", something very important, deep down, a creator and dictator, the deepest "me", which we consider is protecting us. The highest level of the viewpoints on wisdom of the Buddhist schools tells you that this is simply not there the way we think. That does not mean that the ordinary human being that we refer to as "I", the "I" that goes, comes, eats, sleeps, gets up and functions, does not exist. That is not the "I" that we are talking about here.

Actually, if you look at yourself you will notice it. How do you notice? Simply by looking inside without attachment and protection. The "I" that says, "I am outside, I am driving, I am eating, I am in the restaurant, I am in the school, I am in the libraray, I am in the temple meditating", then when you begin to look inside for who that is and where that is, then you find that there are two different kinds of "I". One is more serious, heavy, a little deeper and the other is simple, slight, normal, going, coming, eating, sitting on the pot and so on. That is the usual light "I". This is a very untraditional or unprofessional way of describing it.

You can see these two divisions of the "I". One is a little heavy, a little mysterious, we know it is there but we don't know where it is, and then there is the usual one, "I am going, coming, talking". "This is John speaking", this sort of lightness, that "I" is not the problem, that's not the "I" we are saying is not there. We are talking about Buddhist viewpoints. One should call it "philosophy", but then that puts some people off. They say, "I am not interested in philosophy, but in practice." But the bottom line is that the wisdom really lies at the end of the philosophy and that wisdom is the real essence of meditation. In Buddha's way of doing it ultimately all boils down to one. Without that you won't really manage. Logic, philosopy, understanding, presentation, understanding, all come down to one.

Anyway, the heavy "I" is the one that is not there. If so, show me where it is and what it is. From that angle then you have all these different viewpoints, like the "indivisible" or the "irreducible essence". Still other viewpoints will say that the material basis is the more important one. So when you are fosusing on the physical side you will have the skandhas, which refer to the five sense bases of the material form, based on which we call ourselves "I". So some say, "I am form, sound, smell, touch". Others say, "I am only mind, nothing else, the mind is the most important thing". Still others will say, "It is not only the mind or the form, but the combination, there is something externally existing." Others say "It is not external, but somewhere internal."

All these views are there actually to challenge Nagarjuna's statement that this particular "I" does not exist. There will be debate. They will argue and say, "How can that be possible, I do exist!" That is what we heard in verse 6.

Verse 6

Even the objects of direct perception, such as form and the like,

are established by consensus and not by verifying cognition.

That consensus is false, as is the general agreement that pure things are impure,

for example.

The argument is: I can feel it and touch it and see it, so how can you deny it exists? The reply is: Whatever you saw or heard is not really true. The ordinary person for example thinks that the human body is pure, but to the Buddha's eyes which sees the reality it is impure. Just seeing and accepting something as pure that does not necessarily make it pure. Therefore when you are seeing it, it does not necessarily exist that way.

The second point is: If that is true, how can you explain Buddha talking about impermanent things? Because if something is not there, how can it be impermanent?

This is just like Barabara Boxer's question to John Bolton on his nomination as ambassador to the United Nations, "If you think the United Nations are not there, how can your appointment to them be useful?"

This question is asked in verse 7:

Verse 7

The Protector taught things in order to bring people to understanding.

[Qualm] If these things are not ultimately, but only conventionally, momentary,

this is inconsistent.

So basically, if it is not there, how can it be impermanent? That would be inconsistent. The answer is....unfortunately in the English translation the answer comes first and the question later. I don't know whatever it is. Anyway, the answer is that the Buddha taught in order to bring people to understanding. There is no contradition. Buddha has taught impermanence in order to lead people to the understanding.

Besides, if you are not inherently existent you can still exist. Remember there are always the Two Truths. We didn't begin with one truth.

In Tibetan I can cut the argument in the middle of the verse. In English that does not work. There are actually two contradictions. The first is contradicting what the Buddha said in words. Another contradiction is contradicting the meaning of Buddha's words. That half of the verse is the reply that the meaning is not wrong. So the last line of verse 7 and the whole of verse 8 are about that.

If the argument is made that not only ultimately but also relatively it is wrong then the reply to that is in verse 8:

Verse 8

[Madhyamaka] There is on fault in the conventional truth of the

contemplatives. In contrast to ordinary people, they see reality.

Otherwise, ordinary people would invalidate the perception of

women as impure.

Let me say it this way: Otherwise ordinary people would invalidate the perception of the body as impure. Ordinary people say that the body is pure. In reality it is not. It is faulty. It is a basic principle in Buddha's teaching. The 1st Noble Truth of suffering includes the impure body. In the west people think the body is clean. They say, "If it is not clean, then you get sick." But because it is not pure in the first place that is why you get sick. Becuse it is not pure there is cancer. Because it is not pure there are all kinds of problems. Therefore if it is known as pure that doesn't make it pure. Whatever is known to ordinary people, their perception, is not necessarily true. If it is true there will never be any big discoveries at all. But there are lots of discoveries, chemical, physical, electronical. These discoveries at first are not known. If you only accept known things there can be no discoveries at all. Nothing can be revolutionized, there will no no improvements. There will be just the usual thing going on.

On the other hand, for this level, Chandrakirti says,

Do not lose the relative things that are normally known to all the people.

But that does not mean that you only have to accept what is known to ordinary people. However, you can make some measurement that if everybody disagrees with you then you are slightly crazy. I used to give the example of this Indian guy driving on the highway from Boston the wrong way and the radio announcer says, "There is one person driving the wrong way", and the guy thinks, "One? Everybody is driving the wrong way." But whatever is commonly known is not necessarily true. If so, then there can be no improvement of any kind. Any new thing that is discovered goes against some old theory. If you have to accept the old theory as truth you have to reject every new thing. That means that you are close-minded person.

Verse 9

[Qualm:] How can there possibly be merit to the jina who is like

an illusion, as is the case if he is truly existent? If a sentient being

is like an illusion, why is he born again after he dies?

This gives you the following contradictions: If you say it is not there, how can prayers to Buddha be answered? How can you accumulate merit by making offerings? How can that be possible if even enlightenment itself does not exist in your view of reality? According to you, since there is no positive, then how can there be results of positive actions?

Buddha gives you a lot of different angles of emptiness. Emptiness of many, emptiness of single, and so on. There are up to 20 types of emptiness and somewhere along there is even the emptiness of emptiness. Even emptiness is empty. That is important to emphasize because our mind always wants to cling on. So even if you try to let everything go and find emptiness, the danger then is to cling on to emptiness in the same way. That is why Buddha said that even emptiness is empty.

The argument here is that if everything exists like a magician's illusion how can making offerings have any result? It is also magician-like [illusion].

The reply is: You think that making offerings to Buddha is real and that you get good merit in reality. But I think that you pray and make offerings relatively and you get relative merit. That is good enough. There is no contradiction.

I am taking short cuts now, because unless I do so we will not move on.

The next objection is: If everything exists like a magician's show, how will sentient beings be born again when they die? It is not even possible as a magician's trick! So how can a trick be born again?

Verse 10

[Madyamaka] Even an illusion lasts for as long as the collection

of its conditions. Why should a sentient being truly exist merely

because its continuum lasts a long time?

The Madyamaka-Prasangika people reply: as long as terms and conditions are right, the magician's show will continue for a long time. As long as the conditions are there you will continue. When the conditions cease to be there you will cease to be there. However, the conditions will never cease. They are going to continue. Good or bad, it will change. They won't rotate. That would mean that a good and then a bad one will come. But you don't take turns. It is the karmic system. Remember how the karma functions? Whichever is heavier that comes first and whichever is lighter, softer and gentler, that will come later. If you are pushy, you come first [laughs]. In any case, it will continue.

So again, the objection is: if you don't exist you can't be born or die, because you are not there. Further, they say, "If you don't exist how can there be positive and negative karma? How can there be virtue and non-virtue? That is verse 11:

Verse 11

[Yogacharin:] If consciousness does not exist, there is no sin in

killing an illusory person.

[Madyamaka:] On the contrary, when one is endowed with the

illusion of consciousness, vice and merit do arise.

You may be an illusory person, but with your illusory consciousness you experience positive and negative. You see, the Madyamaka is talking from the point of view that if you exist relatively, it is good enough to exist. The other one is arguing persistently: if you don't exist you should not be there at all. And then if you are not there, there is this fault and that fault, da da da.. That is what they are doing.

Verse 12

[Yogacharin:] An illusory mind is not possible, since mantras and the like

are unable to produce it.

[Madyamaka:] Diverse illusions orginate on account of diverse

conditions. Nowhere does a single condition have the ability to

produce everything.

Actually, animals produced by a magical illusion cannot develop a mind because the material used to make it look like an animal, etc, doesn't contain the conditions needed to maintain a mind.

This is very strange. In the west, when the magicians pull a rabbit out of a hat they actually have a real rabbit. They have just hidden it. But the realy good, traditional Indian magicians don't have anything. They have just some pebbles, a piece of a twig, a little stone and somehow they use the power of mantra or sometimes apply a solution to the eyes of the people. Mostly it is mantra power that causes people to see snakes, elephants, monkeys and so on. In reality it is only pebbles, pieces of wood and so on. In the west a person who could do that is probably called "sorcerer" rather than magician, like Merlin. It could be a translation problem. A sorcerer can use a stick and make it into an elephant through mantra power. As long as the mantra power remains the people will continue to see an elephant. It can be an elephant that threatens the individuals, ready to charge and jump over you, get the trunk ready to throw you around. Sorcerers can do that.

But as soon as the mantra power goes away you will see immediately that there is just a little piece of stone and that threatened you and frightened you and entertained, all of them. Similarly, the sorcerer him-or herself will see the elephant, horse or whatever they have produced, but at the same time the sorcerer knows that it is not an elephant but a piece of stone. The audience don't have the knowledge. They think there is really an elephant, horse, etc.

Here they are talking about the ordinary view and conventional view. The conventional view is equivalent to the sorcerer's. You may see it as an elephant but you know it is only a piece of stone. The ordinary person cannot figure out whether it is a stone or a real elephant. Sometimes a sorcerer can even produce a snake that can bite you and apply poison to you, even though it is just a little piece of thread onto which mantra power is applied. In the western culture that would be called "gifted by God". So when the ancient texts give these examples they are talking about sorcerers, not magicians. That is my fault. I didnt' catch that difference in language. I was wondering, the magician's example didn't work very well, when you consider that a magician pulls rabbits out of the head.

A sorcerer can produce something that looks like an elephant. But they cannot produce a real elephant, because they can't produce real consciousness. Why? The necesssary parts and particles to produce that are not there. The conditions don't come together, therefore a sorcerer cannot produce a real elephant.

That is the example for ignorance deluding your mind. There must be a sorcerer standing there, with white beard and I don't know what they should be carrying in their hands. You have a lot of them in the Harry Potter books and movies. Traditional cultures use the ancient examples.

I think I have come up to the point where I want to leave it. We have come up to verse 12. The next verses, 13 -15 will argue the same important point.

Verse 13

[Yogacharin:] If one could be ultimately emancipated and yet

transmigrate conventionally, then even the Buddha would transmigrate. So what would be the point of the Bodhisattva wayof life?

Verse 14

[Madyamaka:] When its conditions are not destroyed, an illusion

does not cease either. Due to a discontinuity of its conditions

it does not originate even conventionally.

Verse 15

[Yogacharin:] When even a mistaken cognition does not exist, by what

is an illusion ascertained?

From the second half of verse 15 the argument will change from materialist versus mind to the importance of mind. Here the person says that you cannot say "I" don't exist because mind is very important. The mind functions this way and that way. So the "Mind Only" thoughts will come up. I am going to stop here and when I come back we will be dealing with the "Mind Only" views.

There is five points of debate and it is the same thing. The argument will say, if this and that is so, then there will be no nirvana, no liberation, nor samsara. It is almost the same thing. If I keep on repeating it will be quite boring.

With all that let me say we haven't done a bad job here. In the beginning it was very boring and difficult. But you have been coming consistently and have taken a great deal of interest. Thank you. And I am sure this will effect you quite a lot. You may not realize it right now but there will be a time where it will hit you, "Oh yeah, that's what it is!" That is definitely going to happen to each and every one of you.

Additional Remarks

The reason why I am taking a break from the teaching here is that I have a commitment to go to the Netherlands. I have to go there every year for about a month in summer. The last few years I didn't have to go there in winter because Tarab Tulku agreed to go there and teach. So I didn't have to run. Unfortunately Tarab Tulku passed away last year, as you know. So I have to go there and do something - until I can find somebody else who can do something....

When I go to the Netherlands, it doesn't mean that you people here should do nothing. We have a great deal of capable persons here. As a matter of fact many of you have been around me since the mid 80s, have put a lot of efforts in, have gained quite a lot and you started helping me by substituting me and helping others by sharing your knowledge and understanding. That is how we work.

It is very interesting. In American culture they will always want to know about succession. Who is going to come after you? But here you are all here. You are all going to be teaching after me.

For the last 5-6 years people have been asking me about succession. You know that I have been brought here by Aura and Sandy in the early 1980s and they are both very good. At first I thought I would appoint somebody who would be regarded as sucessor, but then, after the unfortunate incidents in Trungpa Rimpoche's dharmadhatu and vajradhatu organization I thought it is best not to name anybody. Tsong Khapa did that too. He had many disciples and eventually they started teaching themselves. They had their own students. They all became Gelugpas. You know, according to the Chinese, 92 per cent of the Tibetans are Gelugpas. All others, Nyingmas, Kargyus, Sakyas, Bon, Christians and Muslims, make up just 7 or 8 per cent. That happened because Tsongkhapa did not apppoint a successor, although there is the position of the Gaden Tripa. But that is very much a figure head. Each and every disciple started practicing whatever they knew and started sharing them and all over the place they started groups, little retreat centers and monasteries. We are supposed to be following these traditions and are looking in that way.

So all of you are successors. So I made a list of instructors and facilitators. Some of you are not named in there, but that does not mean you are not great. You may not be officially an instructor or a facilitator but you are doing the work. It is great and wonderful. I have put thoughts in and recently selected some new people to the list of Jewel Heart instructors and facilitators. I am not going to read the list, but those people are going to be informed individually by the office.

When chosing people for these roles my criteria were not based on taking classes and examinations - as you know. All of you are great. Some names are not put on and that does not mean you are not good. I want to make that absolutely clear. It does not mean that you are not up to the mark - definitely. But the criteria I used are

motivation

dharma knowledge

spiritual experience

These are the fundamental basis which you all have. Then on top of that

art of presentation

some personality

That is the basis on which I did this [laughs]. So if you are not in that list don't feel bad. You are great.

Another point I wanted to say earlier is:

when I am gone overseas you people continue your practice and the Tuesdays have become part of life for many Jewel Heart people. You get in touch with your source, your spiritual home. We have a new series coming up: The Compassion Series. The good news is that there is no charge for this. It is open to all. I have selected people who are going to do this series. Some of them I have contacted and they cannot do it but the others are:

April 19: James Jorah

April 26: Steve Kronenberg

May 3: Chris Branson

May 10: Carolyn Hastings

May 17: Tony King

May 24: Marilyn Hall

May 31: Sandy Finkel

June 6: Supa Corner

Next time we will all meet again will the the Memorial Day Retreat in Garrison and then the summer retreat. Let me emphasize again: the summer retreat is a fantastic opportunity for everybody, seniors and juniors as well as newcomers. It is basically vajrayana, without the vajrayana heavy commitments. There will be lots of healing activities, wonderful meditations, wonderful practices and most importantly, it is in Michigan. It makes it very easy for people from Michigan to come. You don't have to fly or drive a long way. That's why we insist to have that in Michigan. The Mid-west really doesn't have so many of those opportunities. They do have them in New York and California. I mean everyone is welcome but especially for the mid westerners it is a great opportunity. I would really like to encourage that.

I believe we are resuming the Tues teachings from July 5- July 26. There doesn't seem to be so many in that series. I have been requested and pushed to begin on time and finish on time with these meetings. So next time, on July 5th, we will start at 7 pm shap. Even if I am not here, the chanting will begin at 7 pm on the dot. We will try to finish on time, because that is important for many people. People have expressed difficulties. If that applies to me it also applies to those who are doing the compassion series as well as other programs. Please be on time and finish on time. You know in school, when the bell rings everybody gets up and goes. So we will have to have that attitude. We are going back to school here anyway.

Two more things: There are some bad news. Unfortunately the Mayflower Bookshop has burnt down again, just like the year before. It was on the news yesterday. It has burnt completely. This time it might have been an accident. I hope it was. But it is very sad, we all sympathize and give a little support for Robert. That will be nice and kind. Hopefully, a real good Mayflower Metaphysical Book Store will come up at the appropriate place.

Finally, some good news: the Buddha image project has come very very close to reaching the target. I would like to throw the opportunity out to people to donate even small amounts, like 5 dollars and 10 dollars. That way we will get there.

Another thing: Rizong Rimpoche is coming here in May to give the Secret Gaden Lha Gya ma. He is a wonderful and very important teacher and even His Holiness the Dalai Lama has taken teachings from him. He is also the future Gaden Tripa. He is not yet. It depends on how the present Gaden Tripa lives or when he retires from the throne. Normally, the Gaden Trips doesn't stay longer than 7 years. So Rizong Rimpoche is in line to be the next. The previous Gaden Tripa came as Chandzen Cho je and then became Gaden Tripa and we hope Rizong Rimpoche will do the same thing.

Rizong Rimpoche has come to Jewel Hearrt before, as abbot of Drepung Loseling. That was when I was living in Cherry St and we were meeting in 211 Ann St. Here came here as well as to Chicago. So he is not new to Jewel Heart. He is very important and it is a great opportunity to join. Besides that, I have asked him to teach the Secret Gaden Lha Gya ma, which probably has the requirement of a vajrayana initiation, but I think he will do it in an open way. If you can get that it is still a good opportunity.

I have given that Secret Gaden Lha gya ma teaching in New Dehli in the early-mid 70s. Joan Novak and Paul Yurt attended. One morning during the teaching Paul said, "I had a funny dream last night. I had landed in some restricted area and couldn't go anywhere. It happened to be a military area where everything was out of bound. People were chasing me around and questioned, "How did you get in here?" So, apparently I didn't know that he didn't have an initiation. But anyway, it was a good opportunity for him and great. It does interesting thing. And it didnt' harm him and on the other hand he had the total advantage of it. I just thought I would share that. I guess that is it and thank you so much.

20050705GRAABODHI9 PART III

Good evening, everybody. Welcome to this segment of our wisdom series. This segment is for four weeks. We have the four Tuesdays of this month as well as the four Thursdays in New York. Here I have to continue the teaching on Shantideva's bodhisattvacharyavatara, the Bodhisattva's Way of Life. However, at the beginning of this segment I think I have to introduce you to the subject a little. There are new people and I can't just go on straight away with the subject wherever we stopped. On the other hand, I can't continue to do introductions all the time either.

The bodhisattvacharyavatara is an extremely important teaching of early Indian Buddhism on love and compassion. We have been doing it for years and are almost coming to a close. Perhaps we will be able to finish it by next year.

It is one the best ways to achieve the ultimate goal that an individual can achieve. Ask yourself first: what do I want to get out of a spiritual practice? You don't just want to become a clairvoyant, have some control over the weather, be able to control some events here and there. That is not the goal of spiritual practice at all. Where I come from, the spiritual goal is to free oneself and everybody else completely from all sufferings and the causes of suffering. If you get rid of the causes of suffering you also get rid of suffering. When no additional causes are created, then suffering is something that can be finished once and for all. It is like a river valley project. As long as the river has water, you can build dams and have all kinds of projects. But when there is no water coming into the river from anywhere, then no matter how huge the dam might be, it is going to be empty and nothing is going to happen anymore. When the water is cut at the source there won't be any more water.

Likewise, when you cut the source of suffering, there will be no more suffering. That is quite simple. In our case, however, we claim to be spiritual practitioners, but what do we do? We pray for the best, light a couple of candles in church or a couple of joss sticks in the temple. Our spiritual practice falls down to a few simple, little things like that. It is quite unfortunate. As a human being, we have the tremendous capacity of our mind. This mind has no limit for whatsoever. The individual person is putting limits on the consciousness. Otherwise, the mind itself has no limit. It has huge capabilities. There is nothing that mind cannot do. Honestly.

You may think rocket science is great, but it nothing but human mind that has created it. Buddha and Jesus are great, but is nothing but their human mind. This shows that mind has no limit as long as it is associated with a human life. The moment it ceases to be associated with a human body it will connect with another type of body. Then many limitations will come up. Dogs don't speak. All they can do is bark. That is quite clear. The capacity of the human mind can be tapped by anybody. That is what Buddha found out. All the great spiritual beings have done that. They have found out through the spiritual method. The scientists have also reached their achievements through searching for the truth. Philosophers do the same. The aim is to relieve the suffering of the individuals. All great medical achievements are due to the capacity of the human mind. Look back 100 years. Now we have temperature control. When it is cold we can make it hot; when it is hot we can make it cold. A hundred years ago they would have thought it is a miracle to be able to do that. Today it is reality. The human mind has produced this reality. In short, our mind has a tremendous capacity as long as it is attached with a human life.

This life, with this body and this mind, is capable of achieving tremendous results, whatever you do. If you want to become a crook, thief or murderer, this life can deliver that to you as well. Jeffrey Dahmer demonstrated that. Hitler, Stalin and Chairman Mao have perfectly demonstrated what a human life can do, and now Saddam, Bush and all of them are demonstrating it. On the good side look at what Buddha, Jesus, Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Mother Theresa, the Dalai Lama and all of them have done. It is human beings with human capacity. That means you and I have the capability as well. If you use your spiritual path just to gain a little clairvoyance, just to be able to see whether it is going to rain tomorrow or not, that is not a big deal. Such an achievement is nothing to be surprised about. The weather report people know that too. Sometimes their predictions are wrong, but the predictions of clairvoyants can be wrong too. Astrologers know it too. They only have a different way of looking. Clairvoyants will feel it, see it and say it. Astrologers look at how the planets are moving and then say, "There should be this and there should be that." The people working on [mathematical formula and] definitions are doing the same thing in a different way. They move numbers around and do the numerological kind of work.

Human beings have demonstrated that they can be great and we are capable of doing the same thing. When we look at the potential of the spiritual path we should not be underestimating ourselves. We must look further no matter how far it goes, no matter how much it seems to be overestimating ourselves, because this is our only chance. The capability is not there all the time. That is for sure. As I said, dogs bark and people speak. We have the ability to communicate. We can exchange ideas and understandings and there is a development. You can gain it through education. We are all educated and intelligent. We know what power communication has. We can move further on the spiritual path. We can get deeper into it. The capacity is there. We have to make best use of it.

I am coming from the background of reincarnation. I am looking at rebirth and every rebirth is not necessary as a human being. Some people may say that is has to get better and better and can never get worse. Yes, if you are good you will always get better and never worse. But we are not always good. We are quite mischievous, quite naughty. This is not our fault. It is no one's fault. It is just our addiction to our negative emotions that makes us naughty, causes us do something wrong all the time.

When you are looking at a spiritual path, what you really want is change these addictions to negative emotions, and the addictions to samsaric delights. Changing that is dharma or spiritual practice. Our addictions are typically influenced by obsession and hatred. Obsession leads us to enjoy the things of this life for too long. My addiction is to sit in a comfortable place and not move. I get everybody else to bring things and do things and that makes me a couch potato. That is a samsaric delight for me. It is so comfortable, you don't want to stop. Just like that, we are drawn to our comfortable spots, drawn to them by our obsession. We don't want to give them up. We don't want to part with them. In my case, due to becoming a couch potato I gain extra weight on the stomach, on the butt and everywhere else. The samsaric picnic spots will give you that as a result. As a further consequence of gaining weight my diabetic condition worsened. That is what happens. We don't want to give up our source of comfort which obsession has brought us to. And that makes our negativities grow and that makes sure that our life continues in samsara.

Just like that, hatred makes us suffer continuously. "I must get you before you can get me, I must kill you before you can kill me." Where do you think the ideas of pre-emptive strike comes from? It is hatred. That brings us into spots that we dislike but yet are forced to continue. If we don't continue we think we will lose something. That is why John Kerry lost the election, honestly. People thought, "At least that Bush kept us safe for four years, he can probably do it for another four years." It is a fear-driven response. And hatred creates fear. Yes, people dislike war and nobody wants to kill anyone. Certainly we don't want our loved one, our sons and daughters to lose their lives. Yet people are also afraid. There is also an anti-war movement, but it is not very strong yet, because people are still afraid of Osama bin Laden. This is how our present life is driven. Likewise, in all other areas of our life, we are driven by our negative emotions. These activities, driven by negative emotions, will take us away from true liberation. In Christian language, it takes us away from the Good Lord. Honestly. What does "spiritual" mean to me? Understanding and changing that. It is your life and you are the only one you can change anything. No one else. That is what Buddha tells us. Buddha categorically says, "As a Buddha I cannot wash away your negativities. I cannot remove your pain physically."

You cannot move thorns out of roses. Roses are beautiful and attractive, but if you go near and you don't know how to handle them you will be exposed to the thorns. The spiritual development of earlier great beings such as Buddha and Jesus are not transferable to us. Even American Express cannot transfer! Then what is left? They can show the way but we have to do the work.

Buddha is presenting the way how you can help yourself. It comes to us in form of teachings, presentations, talks, whatever. It is entirely up to us what to do with that information. No one can force you to do anything. The zen meditation masters may hit you on the back with a bamboo stick, but even then they cannot force you to sit there. They can only keep you awake. They cannot force you what to think. You are the only one can do it for yourself. All we can do is provide the information. Here in Jewel Heart that's what we are doing, as authentically as possible. Even if it is not a purely authentic way, it is definitely and absolutely true to the tradition. Yet it is acceptable and adaptable to the contemporary, 21st century life in America. That is our mission at Jewel Heart. That's how we try to serve our community. On that basis we have developed a range of programs, not only the ones I am doing personally, but also those run by others. These all boil down to two important points: compassion and wisdom.

The compassion needs to be understood as compassion for yourself and compassion and caring for others. Caring for yourself and others are both very important. We have to emphasize compassion for oneself, because otherwise the moment we think about compassion we look outward. We only think of someone wounded in an accident on the street or a dog run over by a car, with half the body smashed, dragging itself through the street. But we have problems ourselves too. You and me, we have the same problems. Most of all we are crushed by our ego. The lower part of our body is wounded by hatred and obsession. The upper part of our body still has a little bit of self respect with which we are dragging ourselves along.

That's where we are. If I don't care for myself, who else will? Ask that question to yourself very often. Ask yourself every morning, when you get up. When you find the answer you will know what to do. If you still think that the apocalypse will come and during the rapture God will come down and pick us all up you are mistaken. Don't follow the path of the Heaven's Gate cult. They were saying that a space ship was waiting behind the Hale bop comet to take them to paradise. [They said that in order to get on that space ship you have to kill yourself, leave your body and enter that space ship]. I was asking myself at the time: if that kind of transportation is waiting behind that comet why isn't it coming down here, where we are? What is the use of having transportation waiting behind Hale Bop?

The spiritual path is not a joke. It is extremely serious. That doesn't mean you have to be rigid. You don't need to wear a one mile-long face, sitting down all the time. You can be laughing, joyful, jolly, loveable, beautiful, happy-go-lucky and yet serious. That is the beauty and the art of working with the spiritual path. Showing a one mile-long face is not seriousness, it is depression, it is pathetic. Honestly. It only brings trouble for yourself, for your companions and for everybody else. Do not draw the lines of your mouth down, but draw them up, will you? That is really important. Compassion boils down to caring and first and foremost caring for yourself. When you have developed care for yourself, then you care for others and then you need wisdom. Without wisdom you can do nothing. Our subject in this series of talks is wisdom, very detailed wisdom.

Today I would just like to give you a general overview. The great Je Tsongkhapa, the founder of the Gaden Kagyu tradition, a great master of Tibet (1357-1419), wrote a famous praise to Buddha. I am not going to read the whole praise to you, just talk about the first few verses.

(translation taken from R. Thurman's: Praise of Shakyamuni Buddha for his Teaching of Relativity)

Reverence to the Guru, Manjugosha!

I bow to that perfect Buddha, Supreme Philosopher,

who taught us relativity, free of destruction, creation,

nihilism, absolutism, coming, going, unity, and plurality;

the calm beyond all fabrications, the bliss supreme!

I bow to Him, whose insight and speech

make him unexcelled as Sage and Teacher;

The Victor, who realized ultimate truth,

then taught us it as relativity!

Whatever Buddha said is based on his knowledge which came out of his experience. It is not just book knowledge. Therefore Buddha is a teacher without equal. What he talked about is the nature of interdependent existence. Whatever we do, everything that happens in our life and in the world is interdependent.

You may think, "I am an independent American citizen. No one can tell me what to do." Maybe true, but without interdependence there could not be any independent American citizen. America itself depends for its existence on the terms and conditions of every particle in existence. So do all other nations, and so do all human beings, each and every person. Lets take any person as example and call them Mr. X. He is not existing independently, but is a dependent arising. If the terms and conditions are not right for Mr. X to exist, he will not be here or anywhere. When terms and conditions are right, Mr. X is everywhere and he is here. That is interdependence. Throughout the world, in all aspects, there is interdependence. Human communication, contact and exchange, trade, politics, war, everything is interdependent. If you don't have a trading partner, where is your trade? Are you going to sell to yourself, buy from yourself, take profit and loss from yourself? Whether you look at the relationships between two people, or on the level of a society or nation, it is interdependent.

So is war. If there is no enemy, who are you going to declare war on? You cannot declare war on nobody. The president cannot announce from the Oval Office, "As we speak our air force is attacking nobody." That sounds more like the declaration of peace that we have been looking for rather than a declaration of war. Everything is interdependent, also peace. Likewise, all human beings are interdependently existing, not only externally, in terms of relating to others and the environment, but even internally. Our survival is depending on our physical condition, the elements in our body, our soul, consciousness, mind - all combined together are needed for us to be a human being. If one of these factors is missing we become something other than a human being.

Interdependence is extremely important. That is why Tsongkhapa calls it the essence of Buddha's teaching. Buddha saw and understood the interdependence of all existence and shared that with us. Tsongkhapa praises Buddha because of that, not because he is Buddha.

Misknowledge itself is the very root

of all the troubles in this fleeting world;

who understood that and reversed it

taught universal relativity.

The next verse says that all faults and problems of the world are rooted in ego. Ignorance, wrong-knowing, confusion and fear all combine together and we can call that Mr. Ego or Miss Ego. If you don't buy that it is because you don't see the connection. Let me show you:

Our ego thinks that "I have to protect myself, before anybody else hurts me" and we behave like a porcupine, ready to shoot anybody who comes our way. Our ego thinks, "I am superior". It thinks, "I am superior because I am male" or "I am superior because I am female", "Because I am Caucasian, I am superior", "Because I am African-American, I am superior", "Because I am Asian I am superior", "Because I am intelligent, I am superior". That's what we think. Because of that we look down on others. "Because I am male I must look down on females", "Because I am female I must look down on males", "Because I am Caucasian I must look down on African-Americans", "Because I am African-American I must look down on Caucasians and drive a Lincoln - at least 20 years ago that’s what it was like". In that way our ego drives us. All our problems come from thinking, "I am better than you, you are worse than me", "I must destroy you because you are a threat to me". All of that comes from ego.

Look into history. You don't have to look far. Look at Europe in the previous centuries. "Because I am the ruler, you have to do what I tell you to do", "Because you weigh less than you should you must be burnt". That happened in medieval Europe. If as a woman you were fat like me you would have been safe, but if you were good-looking you were in danger. Terrible things still happen today: on the basis of religion or other factors. Why are there always problems in the Middle East? Why can't the situation be resolved between Palestinians and Israelis? All the problems come from the ego of the Palestinians, the Israelis and also from our own egos. Each and everyone of us in involved in that - unfortunately. That is the bigger part of it.

The smaller part: we hurt other beings. We kill mosquitoes before they can attack us, especially when the West Nile virus is being transmitted by them. It is selfish ego protection. But you kill one mosquito and two more will come, then five, six, eight, sixteen and so on. That is how it works, isn't it? Tsonkhapa praises Buddha as one who sees, understands and reverses this condition by teaching interdependence. Interdependence shows that there is no solid "I", the dictator inside of me. "I, the precious rimpoche", "I the queen ant or queen bee". When you see that it is the beginning of the wisdom that Buddha has shared with us.

Thus how could it be possible

that the geniuses would not understand

this very path of relativity

as the vital essence of Your teaching?

Therefore, intelligent people will know that the essence of Buddha's teaching is interdependence of all existence. This is absolutely true. Even scientists will tell us that. Whatever is happening in China affects things in the United States. Even the movement of a butterfly in China affects the weather in the United States. That shows how interdependent we are, in terms of geography, people, business, war and peace and everything else.

This is Buddha's wisdom. It goes quite into detail. The way Buddha presented this is not by saying, "I am Buddha and I say so and you have to believe me". Never ever. On the contrary. He says, "Just don’t' buy it because I, the Buddha, say so. Check with your intelligent mind, your wonderful intuition. Use your thoughts, your mind, check my words and satisfy yourself. If what I say is worth it, take it. If not, throw it in the garbage."

This is what we are going to talk about in this wisdom series, based on chapter 9 of Shantideva's bodhisattvacharyavatara. We have reached up to verse 13 so far. And that is where we will begin next time.

20050712GRAABODHI9

Good evening, everybody. Welcome tonight. We are continuing to talk about the wisdom chapter of the bodhisattvacharyavatara. There are quite a few new people here so if I just started on the point wherever we are you would some difficulty. Last Tuesday I talked about wisdom in a general sense. In essence I said that when you are doing a spiritual practice you must have three things: the base or foundation on which you are standing, the method you are applying and the result you hope to get.

The base we are working on is our usual life. Traditional teachings tell you that it falls under the two truths: relative and absolute truth. The relative truth is our daily life, what we see, hear and feel. The absolute truth is the absolute reality of everything we experience. That is the wisdom we are talking about. Whether we know about absolute truth and relative truth or not we do have them. In terms of relative truth we are born, we get up, we think, we talk and do all kinds of things. We hurt and help people, we use things, we drink a glass of water, we use tables, houses, chairs and everything. That is the relative truth. The absolute truth is the wisdom knowledge. It doesn't matter whether we know it or not. Even if we don't know about it, it is still there, that doesn't make it go away. That's why we have the two truths, the two bases.

The know-how or method we apply, consists of two things: compassion and wisdom. You know about compassion already. I am taking a short cut here. We not only have compassion to people right in front of us, but also for people who are not in front of us and not only that we have compassion for ourselves. As much as you can have compassion for yourself you can generate compassion for others. That brings altruism and finally the unlimited, unconditional love and compassion, which is known as bodhimind.

The second aspect is wisdom. It is fine that the absolute and relative truths are there. But if we don't understand them then we are lacking. We are lacking wisdom. We don’t have such a great lack of compassion. We do have quite good compassion. Every American person has a great compassion - not in the sense of what the Bodhisattvas talk about - but a good compassion. I say this because the actual Great Compassion is for us at this point even hard to imagine. It is focused on all living beings. The desire is to liberate all of them totally from all suffering. That is a little hard for us - a very long shot right now. We don't even have a good compassion for ourselves!

Still, most people in America have a good compassion and we do care for people. If we didn't care for people suffering in Africa there is no reason why we would have had these great Live 8 concerts, [which were watched and supported by millions of people]. Somebody must be caring. All this is quite comprehensible and we do acknowledge it and of course there is a long way to go in that direction.

What we do not comprehend is the wisdom aspect. That is complicated and difficult and there are many different views on that. Many of the early great Hindu-Buddhist thinkers have given their views and many other great religions have contributed to wisdom. It is difficult and very subtle. If it were so easy everybody would get it. The subtlety can also be learned and understood by first going through the gross levels of wisdom. You can't know the subtle level before you understand the gross level.

We are at verse 11-14 in chapter 9. This is actually a debate between two earlier giants of Indian Buddhist thought. In order to get into this you have to know what the debate is about, what these guys are talking about. That is our biggest problem. We are not debating here whether somebody is bald-headed or has white hair or black hair. We are debating whether we exist or not!

Let me put it this way. The wisdom we are talking about is known as "emptiness". Further, everybody will tell you that emptiness doesn't mean that it is empty. It is not nihilism. There is a huge amount of teachings by Buddha on that which has been recorded. There is also a tremendous amount which has not been recorded. From what has been recorded the wisdom teachings have been boiled down to a set of books in 12 volumes, known as prajnaparamita or transcendental wisdom. The essence of these 12 volumes is condensed into one volume of prajnaparamita. We do have a copy of that volume in Jewel Heart. We also have all the collected works of the Buddha here. Buddhist scholars call it the Buddhist Canon. They are supposed to be the collected works of Buddha. What we have here is the translation of the Buddhist Canon into Tibetan. There also a lot of these that have not been translated into Tibetan, which still exist in the original Sanskrit and Pali. On the other hand there are also some original texts that are lost from the Sanskrit and Pali texts, but had been translated into Tibetan. Nowadays these are being translated back from Tibetan into Sanskrit in India. The Tibetan Translation Canon consists of a hundred odd volumes. The Chinese translation has about a dozen volumes more than what was translated into Tibetan.

So the 12 volumes of wisdom texts were boiled down into one volume and that was further boiled down into the Heart Sutra. That is why you see in many Buddhist traditions the heart sutra is regularly recited or chanted. If you look into the heart sutra it says "no eye, no ear, no tongue, no nose" and so on. That doesn't mean we don't have noses. We do have very big noses. True. So what does that mean? We are talking about something that we don't know. Honestly. It is something that we are projecting and perceiving as solid, something deeply important, the real essence of "me". I am not thinking about the Chinese chicken essence or any other juice sucked out of the body that you might be thinking about. We perceive a fundamental essence, something that is beyond body and mind, between body and mind or as a combination of body and mind. Maybe it is what in our culture we think of as the soul. Maybe it is even more powerful than the idea of the soul. Maybe it is the ego. And when you talk about no eye, no ear, etc, we are talking about that ego. It is some kind of great dictator called the real "me", something deep inside. When you try to point it out sometimes it seems to be in the brain or sometimes in the heart or sometimes it seems to be a combination of head and heart, sometimes you think it is the combination of body and mind. We think that's the "real one". That actually is the source of all our difficulties.

Being empty is about the non-existence of such an essence. There is no big dictator. This is the Buddha's presentation of wisdom. In order to recognize that it is necessary to identify what it is that you are negating. For example, before you declare that a particular person is not in the room you have to know who that someone is. I can walk into this room and see all of us here and then I can say, "Mr. X is not here." Before I can declare that, however, I need to know who Mr. X is, what he looks like, what his identity is. I have to know whether he is bald-headed, bearded, fat, thin or whatever. Without that I cannot say, "Mr X is not there." The traditional teachers used to say, "If you want to kill somebody you have to know who you are going to kill. You just can't go and kill anybody and then say "I have killed him". You might have killed somebody else.

The first step therefore is the introduction of the target. Before you negate something you have to know the object of negation. This is actually much more difficult "to get" than the wisdom itself. Understanding it [intellectually] doesn’t mean you "got it". There are two kinds of understanding: one is through communication, words, books and so on. This is understanding following sound or communication. The other is the understanding following the understanding of what the words have described, through a direct encounter with the subject. That is the understanding following reality or experience.

The first is where you just communicate the words, you just understand the message. In order to find the wisdom of the object of negation the earlier masters have said that the understanding following words is not good enough. You have to have a better understanding than that. It is the understanding of the real meaning of the words. In other words, in normal western language, it is the experiential understanding.

For almost every realization on the spiritual path you need the experiential understanding. If you don't have it, it will just become words alone. The words alone don't give you a wrong message but it is not enough. It has to go beyond the words. It is extremely important not to get confused on that.

The moment we think about understanding beyond words we get confused. There is no way of referring back to check whether you are right or wrong. There is no reference point. Without that every single damn thing can become a correct experience. Even if you hit yourself on the head and begin to see stars and different colors you might think "I am having rainbow visions". Gone beyond words in that way is not right. It leads the individual to downfalls - according to Buddha. I can never say never, but to 99 per cent we cannot gain a true experiential understanding, unless we have the understanding that follows words first.

In Tibetan these two are called dra chi (understanding following sound) and dun chi (understanding following meaning or experience). The object of negation becomes hard to really "get". In order for us to get that right, Buddha presented it in a very interesting way. It is presented in many different ways by various schools and each school has its own way of presenting that very point. Buddha didn't judge which point was right or wrong. He left it for us to figure it out by ourselves.

We can talk it over and discuss but it is not like in a democratic process where you debate and finally agree on something that majority decides and then that becomes "right". I don't think this is how it works here. Here you have to figure this out through very fine logical thinking. This then has to be confirmed by the statements of the masters and texts. That will confirm whether you are right or wrong. And then you have to take it in. You do need that.

As for the logical thinking there is a defined set of rules. Otherwise you can think whatever you come up with and argue all over the place. Buddha's example is the wheel with its spokes. In old India they had horse carts and bullock carts. So wheels were known as "chakra". That is how the Dharma-chakra came about. The traditional Buddhist temples have a big wheel on the roof and two little deer standing nearby. That wheel also has a lot of spokes. All the spokes fit within the rim. To have a functioning wheel you cannot go beyond the rim with your spoke. In the example it would mean: "No, no, I cannot agree to any reason". That is too stubborn. Or even if your own reasoning is proved to be wrong you keep insisting on your point. That means going beyond the rim. You have then gone out of the dharma chakra. It is just being stubborn.

The other extreme is that you are flying. You are not rooted in your argumentation. You just say all kinds of things, pick up ideas from here and there and throw them in. In the wheel analogy that would mean bringing all kinds of things into the wheel that fly around and disturb and hit everything. It means you are not rooted. Very often I say, "Don't fly". In terms of the wheel, all the spokes have to be rooted at the central hub. Outside they can't go beyond the rim.

I am not going to teach you how the debates on logic are done, that's not my job, but we have to be sure about the basic way of how to figure out the wisdom. You do need a framework. Without framework, it could be anything. There are certain ideas that Buddha refused to accept. One extreme idea is that of the Cravakas. They say that the whole of existence consists of exactly 25 segments. Everything to be known is counted as part of these 25. That sounds like what many of us do. We put everything into boxes. We find something and say, "Oh, this is a Buddhist thought. Let me put it into the Buddhist box and label it." or "This is a Christian thought, put it in the Christian box and label it "Christian". We do the same with Jewish thoughts and Hindu thoughts and Muslim thoughts. After labeling everything we are satisfied and think, "Situation under control". Like that, these Cravakas declared that the whole existence is made up of 25 segments.

Another school says, "If you can't see something it means it doesn't exist." They say, "I can't see my past or my future, therefore there is no past or future. Whatever I can enjoy right here, let it be." The Buddhists will then argue, "In that case you might as well make love to your daughter." The Cravaka will say, "Why?" The answer comes, "If you love your daughter, why can't you make love to her?" Cravaka, "it is not right." Answer: "Why not?" The conclusion from the Cravaka's belief that past and future don't exist would have to be that right and wrong also don't exist, because there would be no consequences of actions. Therefore they have gone completely outside of the wheel's rim, they left the base of everything. That way they can't establish the truth.

Even among the early Buddhist schools there were many different views. Some could never establish the truth. One debate is: A sorcerer comes in and produces a beautiful flower vase in the air and then asks, "What is that flower vase made out of? What is the true status of that vase?" The different schools will have different answers. One says, "The vase is true, because it is a vase. Although it is a vase manifested by a sorcerer I can see it and touch it and I can even put water in it." Others will say, "My mind-acknowledgment may not be true, but I see and therefore it is true". This debate is mainly between the mind-only school and others. The mind-only will say, "Even though my eyes are mistaken and confused I saw it. Because I am confused that is what I saw." So the first says, "It is true because I see it" and the mind only says, "You see what you see because you are confused. "They say, 'If I am not confused I wouldn't see it, but I saw it because I am confused."

According to the mind-only school, ultimately, it is only the mind that makes a difference, nothing else. Everything I see outside, whatever I see, hear, touch and see, it is the mind inside that has made it. Does that sound familiar? In the sixties we used that explanation a lot. I don't know how true it really was, but once I was having a beer in the Nerula bar in Dehli with Norbu, the Dalai Lama's elder brother, the Taktser Rimpoche, who was a professor in Indiana. Taktser Rimpoche started telling me, "Some hippies these days…." Of course the blame always goes to the hippies. The yuppies get the credit, the hippies get the blame. But sometimes I can go vice versa. It is a two way street. Anyway, so he said, "These hippies picked up pebbles from the street and tried to buy airline tickets with that, saying, "It is the mind that makes a difference and this is gold." Some people there must have been really high. How knows, maybe that really happened. That's why I thought this might sound familiar to some.

The mind only school holds that the mind is what matters, nothing else and when the mind is wrong and confused, then everything outside is also wrong. When the mind is right and correct, everything external is correct. They only accept that the mind is true.

Another viewpoint, which is supposed to be better than that, argues, "Mind only is not really true, because there is something that exists on the basis of the vase alone." They say, "If there is nothing there from the point of view of the vase then a perfect mind cannot perceive it." If there is nothing there at all then a faultless mind cannot perceive it. Something must be there and then the meeting of that with a perfect mind creates the valid existence of the vase.

We always use the vase as example. You could use anything else as example. It is about life, me and human beings and everything. Pillars and vases are the Buddhist philosophers' aspirin. They use those everywhere and another one is the rabbit's horn. It is a great example of something that doesn't exist. The rabbits have ears and sometimes from the distance when they raise them it looks like they have horns. But of course, when they move the ears back you see there are no horns.

This is what ultimately the real essence of Nagarjuna's, Buddhapalita's and Chandrakirti's position is supposed to be. So that very vase in front of us came into existence collectively or interdependently. That is why it can be seen by a perfect mind. In [absolute] reality, nothing exists. That is supposed to be the real meaning of Buddha's statement of "no eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue, no form" and that these are all empty.

Right after that statement in the heart sutra the next words are: "form is emptiness, emptiness is form. Form is no other than emptiness, emptiness is no other than form." So right after saying that there is no eye, no ear, no nose, no dick, etc, …it says that form is emptiness and emptiness is form. This means that things come into existence only collectively or interdependently and that this itself is emptiness and emptiness itself is interdependent existence.

In order to get to interdependent existence, [we have to look at] our projection, idea or understanding, that over years and years - and according to Buddhism, lives and lives of efforts we have put in - produced the idea that there is something called "I". You really have to recognize that. Once you have identified it you have to search for it.

In Pabongka's Liberation in the Palm of your Hand, at the wisdom level, there is this example: you are looking for an elephant in a house. You go in and see a buffalo, a monkey and a horse. You take the horse, buffalo and monkey out and then you should see the elephant there and be able to point out, "Here is the elephant!" If you don't see an elephant you can declare, "There is no elephant in here."

Likewise, before you say, "I am empty", you have to know what you are empty of. You have to know what you are perceiving. Your mind is going to build up so many other ideas. It will never just accept that "I don't exist". On the contrary, it will say, "I am here, as large as life, don't you see me? I am bald-headed or bearded or fat or thin or whatever."

That is the reason why you have this dialectical debate between these two schools here. The way the debate works is: if you accept this or that view you will have this and that problem as a consequence. When you get these problems [absurd consequences] it is a clear sign that you are wrong. Then you have to accept that you are wrong, rather than be stubborn. That is the rule you have to abide by when you debate.

But we do like to play around with the rules a little it. I tell you a story. When I was young, living in the monastery, there used to be big debates between the different monasteries and their colleges. There was one particular one between my college, Losseling, and Gomang College on the prajnaparamita. I and a friend from Loseling were defending a particular viewpoint in the great assembly hall and some people from Gomang College came and asked questions. After a while all the senior monks came over and the whole college debated. The argument was about the levels of attainment in concentrated meditation, at which point there may or may not be any feeling, where you are half dead and half alive. I was doing quite okay and no matter how strong the questions came I was defending my view perfectly. We started at 5.30 pm and it went on till 11 pm. Suddenly, a young Mongolian guy came in. He was very sharp, extremely sharp. All the senior monks had already given up and had mostly left. This guy was very sharp. He had a thick Mongolian accent and I kept pretending that I couldn't understand him. I kept saying, "What did you say? I couldn't get it what you said". If I had really answered I would have lost. Since I defended so well the whole night I didn't want to lose in the last couple of minutes. It is like in the football game where you don’t want to risk being beaten in the last minutes. So I just pretended I couldn't understand his Mongolian accent. It was really very heavy. I might have gone outside of the wheel but it was only to pass a couple of minutes.

We should now concentrate on the actual verses at hand. Verse 13 gives the argument against the mind only.

Verse 13

[Yogacharin:] If one could be ultimately emancipated and yet

transmigrate conventionally, then even the Buddha would transmigrate.

So what would be the point of the Bodhisattva way of life?

Verse 14

[Madyamaka:] When its conditions are not destroyed, an illusion

does not cease either. Due to a discontinuity of its conditions

it does not originate even conventionally.

If the Mind only view is true, then Buddha is only mind and Bodhisattvas are only mind. And then what is the point of the Bodhisattva way of life? This is very tricky. If there is one condition and one cause, then nothing could exist. There would be nothing called absolute and nothing called relative. Buddhahood would be the same as samsara and why would one put any efforts in? In other words, if there is only mind, why should there be Bodhisattvas and Buddhas? Since it is only the mind, all you would have to do is think of good things. This becomes like love and light. Just think something positive, why worry? But no matter how long you keep on thinking good things, nothing will happen. It won't make anything different. After a little while you are tired and burnt out completely. Sending good thoughts, receiving good thoughts - if you expand on that it will be love and light. If only the mind makes any difference why don't you just go and be love and light and goo ha ha ho ho. That is not right. Further you can come from the opposite side, "if there is nothing there, if there are all the conditions in the mind, why should you work for enlightenment?"

The conclusion is: if mind is all there is then just sending good thoughts should liberate you. But that's not going to happen. You can send good thoughts for a million years but in the end you will be the same old groundhog that went in. From the opposite side: if there is nothing existing, why bother doing anything? The answer is: there is something that is arising collectively and interdependently. Therefore, interdependent existence is the reality and interdependently there is enlightenment, interdependently there is samsara and nirvana. That is why there are the two truths, relative and absolute.

Now the question rises: what has this whole argument got to do with me? It has got everything to do with me. I am seeking liberation, I am seeking wisdom, and the wisdom I need to get is the interdependent wisdom. In one way it looks like two great Indian giants are debating. But in reality it is showing a dialogue within ourselves. The question really is: who is me? Form is empty, emptiness is form, and so on means that existence and emptiness is one. There is no separation. I am existing interdependently and emptiness is nothing different from that and that is called: The essence of emptiness is interdependence and the essence of interdependence is emptiness.

20050719GRAABODHI9

Welcome here tonight. We are in the middle of the debate between two of the early great masters who are presenting the object of negation.

If you only come here for the first time today that may not be very clear to you. We are talking about wisdom, which is emptiness. Emptiness is not nothingness. Emptiness is about refuting something and what we refute is called "object of negation". We are refuting a particular perception of self. It is about "I" and "my". What kind of "I" are we talking about? Are we simply talking about the "I" which is functioning, the "I" that is the basis of karma? Another question is: What is the use of talking about that in the first place? Are we trying to become philosophers? What has that got to do with our lives? Many people ask this question.

The important point here is your goal of spiritual practice. In Mahayana Buddhism, the goal is total enlightenment and any Buddhist practitioner will at least have the goal of liberation. What liberates whom from what for what purpose? This is the issue. Otherwise all our practices will only be prayers or exercises. Just to do something, that is good enough for the purpose of whoever is doing it, but it doesnt' go very far. I don't want to criticize anybody, but for example one of our good friends does a workshop,. where people make masks themselves. Then they wear the masks, go into five different directions and dance around, then they come back. And that is the end of the particular part of the workshop. It is called dakini dance. That maybe good for whatever the purpose of the workshop may be but it doesn't go for liberation or enlightenment - unless there is some vajrayana link somewhere.

Whenever we have a spiritual path we need three things: the base we are standing on, the thing we are going to do and the result we hope to get. Without these any practice is limited. I have a friend who in the 1980s attended a workshop where people spent a whole week learning to walk on fire. They had to pay $100 a day for seven days. At the end of the $700 they had to cross over some burning charcoals in the street. Some managed to walk over, without saying Ouch, but many got blisters. And that was a spiritual work shop in those days! I don't really see anything spiritual in that. Nor is drinking wheat grass juice and eating brown rice anything spiritual. It may be very good for health, but those who are not used to eating brown rice may end up with stomach problems. Samdong Rimpoche came here once and we gave him nori rolls, which contain brown rice and he had a stomach ache for three days. He couldn't eat anything for the next three days.

Where we stand, what we do and what we get out of that is very important to know first. According to Mahayana Buddhism we are standing on the basis of the two truths. The method we apply is wisdom and compassion and what we hope to get is total enlightenment. This is our purpose, this is what we are doing. Let that be very clear.

If you are not a mahayanayin, but follow the Hinayana, still the same principles apply: where you stand, what you do and what you hope to get. The Hinayana does not have compassion to the extent that the Mahayana has it but Hinayana equally emphasises the wisdom aspect. Without that you can't get anywhere. There are five paths, in Hinayana as well as in Mahayana: the path of accumulation of merit, path of action, path of seeing, path of meditation and path of no more learning.

The path of seeing means to see emptiness. After that you keep on meditating on emptiness. That is the path of meditation which goes over 9 stages. The last of these, which is very subtle, is called the vajra-like stage. This is totally non-vajrayana, just called vajraa-like. From there you transfer to nirvana. There is nirvana with left-over and nirvana without left-over. The terminology of nirvana is used by both, Mahayana and Hinayana. But the Hinayana point of nirvana is not the total enlightenment. Their nirvana is the complete exhaustion of afflictive emotions. The Mahayana nirvana goes beyond that and goes up to the Buddha level, the total enlightenment. Both are freedom. The Hinayana-nirvana is free of samsara, the Mahayana nirvana is free of both, samsara and [the Hinayana-] nirvana. The Mahayana calls it freedom from the two extremes of samsara and nirvana. This is not exactly the same as the two extremes of existentialism and nihilism but in a way the Hinayana nirvana actually represents nihilism. Freedom from those extremes is called total enlightenment. But wherever you look, the path which delivers the goods for the individual in any case is the wisdom. How intense, how subtle the wisdom is, that makes a difference whether the individual is able to get rid of just the afflictive emotions or also their imprints, as in the case of full enlightenment.

That is the reason why Buddha comes out with all these different viewpoints about the object of negation. What are we negating exactly? That is the point where we are. That has everything to do with us as spiritual practitioners. We are seeking liberation. We are seeking freedom. For that we need wisdom. Love and compassion are great and necessary but they are not the direct antidote of samsara. The root of samsara is ma rig pa, which is usually translated as ignorance, not knowing, wrong knowing, not seeing and so on. It is the direct opposite of wisdom. Literally ma rig pa means not knowing or not seeing. You can say: not seeing rightly. Love and compassion is not the direct opposite of that. Therefore love and compassion alone cannot overcome samsara. Compassion brings the bodhimind and that makes you a Bodhisattva. You cannot become a Buddha with bodhimind only. Though bodhimind is a cause for becoming a Buddha it is the wisdom that really delivers it. Wisdom is the negation of whatever we think the "I" is made of. That's why we have all these terms such as selflessness, "I"-lessness and so on. For some reason the translators have to add up the -ness. They could just leave it at self-less.

There are many different viewpoint of what the object of negation is. We have come a long way from stating that it is some irreducible essence. Some talk about an indivisible self. Some say it is a mixture of the perceiving mind and the object that it perceives. We have been able to negate each and every one of those. Now we have come to the view that says: there is nothing external, it is only the mind. All the debates that are presented in the verses 11 onwards are about that view.

We are now talking about verse 15.

Verse 15

[Yogacharin:] When even a mistaken cognition does not exist, by what

is an illusion ascertained?

Before we go into this you have to know more about the mind-only way of presenting the object of negation. Asanga is one of the 8 great teachers of ancient India, the 6 ornaments and 2 excellences. The teachings will tell you that Asanga's actual viewpoint is the highest, but officially, for practical purposes, he is the founder of the mind-only school. His views are the mind-only school's views.

Buddha has stated in the Sutra of the Ten Stages:

All three realms are just mind.

The three realms are: above the ground, on the ground and under the ground. In normal American terms that means: hell, heaven and earth. That statement has created a flood of controversial interpretations and views. Buddha used the word "just" in that statement. The mind-only school takes that statement to be direct and straight forward. They say that whatever we see outside and experience is the effect of the mind inside. They say that there is nothing external. It is only the mind that has produced everyting, nothing else. Their line of argument will go:

Do you see me? Yes, I see you, because my mind perceives you. Therefore you are here. If my mind does not perceive you, then you are not here. You may be produced by somebody else's mind, otherwise you are not there at all.

That may be a little extreme, but that is what mind-only means. The Prasangika-Madyamaka school is negating that viewpoint. All these different views are presented in order to refine and sharpen the understanding of the individual, make it more subtle and more clear. That is why you go through the process of finding out that this view is not perfect, and that view is not perfect and finally you refute even the most subtle level of holding the wrongly perceived "I". For example the view that claims that existence depends on the perceiving mind as well as the external object is considered to be below that of the mind-only school. We have refuted this by saying that there must be something out there even if mind does not perceive it.

You know that zen story about the tree falling in the forest and if nobody sees is fall, does it really fall? There is the assertion that that tree does not fall if nobody has seen it or heard about it. This is the view that says, "Existence is the combination of perceiving mind and perceived object. If these don't meet, the object does not exist." According to them the tree falling in the forest does not exist if nobody sees is fall. That is not right. We all know that. The tree falls in the forest anyway, whether somebody sees it or not.

Very similarly, one school asserts something called basis of all (Tib: kun zhi) That means there is no external objects, and not only the mind either but there is some basis on which your karma is functioning. Your whole karma is carried by that. There is a lot of back and forth argument on that.

For example: If you accept such a base which includes your whole karma then if you have the karma to be reborn as an elephant, do you have an elephant in your karma? - if you accept that view you would have to say yes. Then it follows that if a little ant has the karma to take rebirth as an elephant and if that ant climbs up a little hair, is there at that moment hundred elephants climbing up that hair? The karma for that is there and the ant is carrying that karma. Of course it is crazy to say that there are 100 elephants on top of that hair. That is how you refute that view.

Similarly, now the mind-only school is the target to be refuted. Let me re-state their interpretation of Buddha's statement: hell, heaven and earth are just mind. They take that literally, saying that nothing exists that is not mind.

Nagarjuna interprets that statement from the Sutra of the 10 stages differently. It is a bit like the legal arguments in a court case. That can go as far as saying, "It depends what "is" is". [President Clinton's defense, when challenged with lying about a love affair]. Here it goes almost to this point. Nagarjuna accepts that Buddha said "just mind". Literally that means that everything other than mind is cut out. That's how the mind-only school takes it. Nagarjuna disagrees with that conclusion. He says that would be reading Buddha's statement out of context.

He points out that in the next section of the same Sutra of the Ten Stages Buddha says,

All the various kinds of existence come out of karma.

Nagarjuna says that this statement has to be seen in relation to the statement that says that all existence is just mind. According to that: hell, heaven and earth have come out of karma and karma is created by the mental faculty called mind. That is our normal mind and is one of the 5 mental faculties that always accompany a mental process. Therefore Buddha in his statement that all existence is just mind does not cut out everything that is not mind, but he cuts out everything that is not created by mind. In other words Buddha aims to cut out the view that some creator person has created all existence and the view that the whole existence is not created at all. The word "just mind", according to Nagarjuna, has to be understood in that way. This is a more subtle interpretation.

Nagarjuna further quotes Buddha saying in the same sutra,

All 12 links of interdependent existence are just mind.

The 12 links are a way of describing the whole existence in terms of 6 realms where all beings take rebirth. These are the samsaric gods, demi-gods, humans, animals, hungry ghosts and hell beings. They are bound to their existence by 12 activties like in a wheel. The first of these 12 is ma rig pa, the ignorance which is the root of samsara. This is portrayed as a blind guy, someone who doesn't see what they are doing. In that blindness this guy creates all kinds of karma and that is the 2nd link. The third link is consciousness which is divided into causal- and resultant consciousness, which links up to the 11th link. In that way there are 12 links. It gets quite complicated. When Buddha says that all 12 links are just mind, that cannot be taken to mean that apart from mind nothing exists. Rather, it means that it is only the karma of the individual that creates everything. Karma (Tib: le) in turn is created by the mental faculty called mind. In that way your mind inside of you is the creator of your own existence. By creating karma, good or bad, there is the connection of the karmic result with your mind and you will experience good and bad incidents, birth, death and so on. When that karma is exhausted you go back into the gross impermanence of death and you start recycling your existence. Buddha's emphasis on "just" mind has to be taken to mean that there is no single person who created everything for everybody. Nor is there some kind of continuation that created it. Form did not create it. A cause or a condition did not create this. Atoms, molecules and particles did not create this. It has not been created by samsaric gods. So finally Buddha says,

I simply say that it is the mind that created it all.

With this Buddha is merely negating that our individual and collective existence has been created by any of the above mentioned. Actually it is created by ourselves. Here also, out of the external physical self and internal mental self, the internal mind-nature self is more important than the external form. Therefore Buddha stated that it is "just mind".

So we went round in this whole circle to find out that Buddha meant that mind is the most important thing. Nagarjuna explains that point further, by quoting Buddha from another sutra. The sutra gives an example of how doctors treat patients. This was before antibiotics came in. So in old India, 2600 ago, there were no thermometers. So when someone was suffering from fever, they would give them special herb mixtures and tell them not to eat meat. This is because meat can push the fever higher and you may not be able to control it. So then you eat other food like tofu, cheese or whatever. Then when the fever comes down quite a lot, the doctors would encourage you to eat meat because you have to rebuild your physical strength.

I have come from that old world and do have a very nice, kind doctor friend of mine. He treated a lot of people when I was a kid. Those doctors would never take money and even the medicines were free. Also, they would prepare separate mixtures of herbal medicines for each patient to suit their needs at the time. The doctors would make these preparations themselves, collect the herbs, dry them, soak them, whatever was needed. In the old days we never got those herbal medicine pills that you see nowadays. It was always like grass-dust, with wooden sticks mixed in. They were freshly made and the doctors would smash the substances a little bit but not much. Sometimes they would tell the patient to grind them down more, because one person can't do all that. The doctors would change medicine for each patient almost every other week, continuously checking pulse, urine and so on. This particular doctor I knew would always go to the market and buy legs of sheep or yaks and give them to poor patients and tell them to make bone soup. The medicine worked very well because of the individual attention.

Nowadays it is harder to make it work. I am not saying that Tibetan medicine doesn't work any more, but the recipes for the herbal mixtures are unified now. Everybody with high blood pressure will get the same thing. I am not sure how well it really works.

Anyway, the example says that like the good doctor who gives medicine to suit the individual's needs, Buddha also presented wisdom to people according to their capability of understanding. If he would have told certain people that they don't exist they would have got extremely scared and might have run through the streets, shouting, "I don't exist." To avoid that Buddha would share different ideas with different disciples at different levels.

There is one more important point in that regard. Even though these are Buddha's words we still should examine them. Buddha himself said,

Don't buy what I say just because I, the Buddha said so. Examine it like you would examine gold. You will burn, cut and rub the gold until you are convinced that it is pure gold.

When you examine Buddha's teachings in this light there will be two categories: one is where you take literally exactly what Buddha said. In the other category Buddha had a different intention and his words should be interpreted correctly. Buddha prophesied that Nagarjuna and Asanga would come. He said that they would appear 300 and 600 years after him and clarify what he had said. Therefore you cannot directly take everything literally, even if the name of the author is Buddha. This Sutra of the 10 Stages falls into that category.

So on the subject of wisdom particurly, you cannot just quote Buddha and say, "Buddha said so." This has been refuted by Buddha himself and many great masters after him. You have to rely on reality alone. Reality is using your own intelligent mind and check it against what has been accepted by outstanding persons; bring these together, turn them around, fool around and work with them, taste, them, smell them, bite them, do whatever you can and thereby increase your understanding.

So the bar of wisdom is raised ever higher. Otherwise all you would have to do is pick up any quote from someone and declare, "it is true, because So and so said so." Buddha advised not to do that. He said, "Use your own intelligence and find out." The mind -only school claims that based on Buddha's statement in the Sutra of the ten Stages there is only mind. But you have to work with this and deal with it and master it. That is what wisdom is all about.

For some people love and compassion is very easy to understand and wisdom is extremely difficult. On the other hand, those with scientific background may find wisdom easier to comprehend. Someone told me, "Wisdom is something I can quite easily comprehend, but love and compassion I just cannot buy it. From my scientific background I cannot just believe it. It doesn't work for me." Wisdom on the level of tracing the self, and finding that there is no irreducible essence, not even in molecules or atoms, and so on, is easier for scientifically trained people to understand. Scientists probably feel at home with this and it is not a problem for them. But for many others it is. For me wisdom was a big problem, and compassion comes easy. For them wisdom is easy and compassion is difficult. For a scientifically minded person to accept that every being has been their mother is next to impossible. They will say "No, I am not buying that, what are you talking about?" But when you talk to them about wisdom it makes perfect sense to them.

The bottom line on this debate about existence is: is there any external existence? The prasangikas say, "Yes, there is external existence and there is internal existence. You also have a link between those." Those who think that there is no external existence but only mind are being refuted. That is the textual material we are going to deal with. The prasangika madhayamaka, following Nagarjuna, do accept external existence, but all external existence only exists relatively. In other words, whatever the object you label may be, when you start searching for it you are not going to find it. Therefore it only relatively exists. Am I here? Yes, I am. Do I work? Yes, I do. Do I exist absolutely? No. When you search for "me", you are not going to find anything that you can point out. There is no end of the Russian doll. Therefore it doesn't exist truly, however it does exist relatively, because everything functions. We are siting here, listening, talking, working, and trying to break through the mystery of existence.

The wisdom of emptiness cuts through the mystery of life and existence. There is no question about it. Why is that necessary? Unless we do cut that we will be subject of delusion. Delusions and addictions use us and we become their slaves. That makes the suffering lives continue, one after another. We are born, grow up and die, continuously. We have not been able to break through the mystery of life. This is the bottom line of Buddha's teachings of wisodm. The real mystery is the object of negation. It mystifies us, makes us confused and every trouble comes because of that. When you are searching for that mystery, you start looking inside, outside, you consider the combination, you check whether it is mind only or only external. Has somebody made it and I have nothing to do with it? If you are searching for the mystery- that is where the search takes you.

You need to apply your own intelligent mind and find out what makes sense. Does it make sense that somebody has made us? Of course our parents made us. But that is not the whole truth. Every sperm and egg does not produce a human being. Some do, some don't. That clearly indicates that it is not only the parents who make the child. There is more than that. The mystery begins right there. I guess this is what we are up against. I don't know when we will break through, but that is the path Buddha laid out. Millions have followed it and broke through the mystery, so why not us?

The next verses, 16 and so forth, will directly contradict the mind-only view. I am going to stop here for today. Are there any questions?

Audience: Out of the five aggregates what is the mind that you are talking about?

Rimpoche: It is the sixth sense. You have the five senses, eye, ear, nose, etc and this mind is the sixth. It is also known as principal.

Audience: If external things only exist relationally, can the same be said of the mind?

Rimpoche: A lot of people say that the mind is the one that truly exists. That is not true. The mind does exist, but also not independently. It exists interdependently. The perceiving mind comes in here too. I just don't think that an external object exists only when it is known by somebody's mind. Otherwise, a tree falling in the forest couldn't exist unless someone sees it falling. The tree does fall, even if nobody knows. The zen people will counter-argue that in any case, somebody always knows, there are ants and bugs where the tree falls. You can say that. I am just joking.

Audience: Did you say that just mind creates our misperception of everything in heaven, earth and underneath?

Rimpoche: Nagarjuna says that this is all created by karma and karma is created by the mental faculty called mind. That is the Buddha's intention when stating that heaven, hell and earth are just mind.

Audience: Is karma equating misperception then?

Rimpoche: Everything is karmic. This is Buddhism.

Audience: I understood that mind only means that only the mind continues on. If karma is part of one's mind, and according to Nagarjuna karma creates everything, then what is the difference from Shantideva's and Nagarjuna's perception compared to that of mind-only?

Rimpoche: I will not say that karma is mind. I can say that mind is very involved with creating karma, but I will not say that karma is mind. Also, the mind only school says that mind is solid and permanent. Everything external does not exist. That is the mind only school's main tenet.

Audience: You mentioned base, path and result. I take it that each of the Buddhist paths will lead to enlightenment. What then is the necessity to have a more refined understanding of wisdom in the mahayana, if the result of enlightenment is the same?

Rimpoche: First of all, I don't think it is true that all Buddhists share the goal of enlightenment. The Theravada has the goal of attaining personal liberation, not full enlightenment. Out of the four schools of Buddhist philosophy, the middle path school (Tib: u ma-skt: madyamaka) and the mind-only school (Tib: sem tsam pa - skt: chittramatra) are mahayana. The other two, chetra ma wa and do de pa (Vaibashika and Sautrantika - great exposition school and realist school) are not. They are hinayana. Secondly, the goal of the middle path school and that of the mind-only school may be the same, but that still doesn't mean that they actually achieve it.

20050726GRAABODHI9

Good evening everybody. We are getting together here today in the last meeting of this segment of the wisdom course. When I look back at what we did in this particular period, I see that we didn't really much out of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara, except a few verses. But whatever we have covered, although it has not become a solid thing yet, it might have helped to create some foundation. It might not even be a foundation, but we talked a number of fundamental points.

We started by talking about Tsongkhapa's praise of Buddha. The most important praise in there refers to Buddha as the one who is sharing whatever he knew. He refers to Buddha as "teacher without equivalent". No one can equal Buddha as guru, spiritual master or spiritual guide. All boils down to the fact that he shared with us whatever he knew. He saw, understood and developed and then shared that, particularly the interdependent nature of existence. How do we exist? Existence is not necessarily who we are, but how do we exist? What should we do, what is our aim and purpose?

People raise the question, "What is the mission of my life?" or "What is the mystery of my life and how can I clear it?" Tsongkhapa, by talking about how Buddha understood interdependent nature, is talking about that level of existence. How do we exist interdependently? Buddha gave the answer and Tsongkhapa praised him for it. The interdependent system in which we exist is not visible to us. Individually we are completely pure, however, we don't show our purity, instead we give people the cold shoulder. We are pure and wonderful, arising interdependently. Why don't we see this? What blocks us? What is the difficulty here? Tsongkhapa gives the answer,

All the faults and difficulties every existing for everyone of us come from ignorance.

In Tibetan it is ma rig pa, not seeing, not knowing. It is often translated as ignorance. The connotation of that word normally is to be slightly stupid and not knowing anything, but here the meaning is slightly different. This is because this state of mind is not stupid. It is extremely intelligent, witty and powerful. It is also a confused state at the same time. It looks very nice, but is very manipulative. It speaks, as though it is very concerned for our welfare, but in fact is pushing us down and completely controls our life. Each and everyone of us is in that situation. This is the ego. It is in the nature of fear. Traditional teachings introduce this is the object of refutation or object of negation. We are now in the midst of the debate between the perfect view on wisdom and a view that is not necessarily perfect. Every philospher, by every spiritual school, has a presentation of wisdom. The bottom line question is really, "Who am I?" I considered that question a long time ago as not relevant, because whoever we are, we are only in a relative way, only identifiable by terms, conditions, name and time. We are not just straightforwardly "me". So I am thinking that it may or may not be necessary to identify that. A lot of other practitioners think it is. Whatever it maybe, this is the source of all suffering and misery. This is the one that is to blame, the one that made all this happen. That's why it is called "object of negation" or "object of refutation". I prefer 'object of negation'. That is more powerful than just refuting it.

There are all kinds of viewpoints as to what this object of negation exactly is. The first idea we looked at is the idea of an indivisible entity. We could clearly show that such a thing is impossible. Then, it was the idea of the combination of external existence and internal mental functioning. We showed clearly that this is also not possible. Then we came to the view that holds that there is only mind alone, that there is nothing external. That view is also not possible to hold. I shouldn't draw that conclusion yet, because we are still in the midst of the debate about that. However, the bottom line is that this also is not possible. External objects are a reality. A bottler of water is a bottle of water. A glass of water is a glass of water, a microphone is a microphone, a glass case is a glass case, a book is a book, table is table, chair is chair, I am me and you are you. To think that external things are not there except as a reflection of the mind and that when there is no mind nothing happens is not correct. That is the view that is being refuted now.

We talked about the famous zen saying that when a tree falls in the midst of the forest and if nobody hears, sees or acknowledges that, that then there is no tree falling. They say that no mind acknowledges it and therefore, without the effect of the mind, it doesn't exist. But the reality is that a tree does fall, whether anybody sees it or not. There is no doubt whether it falls or not. The doubt is brought up in the process of finding the object of negation. This shows you how difficult it is to find. The mind-only-chittamatra view is a mahayana school and one of the highest views. They go to the extreme of stating that if no mind acknowledges it, it never happened. So, if nobody has seen it you can hush it up and sweep it under the carpet. That doesnt' work. It is quite clear. Mind-only actually doesn't work.

The confusion during the debate comes because of the presentation of external existence and internal perceiving mind. What is the relationship between these? There is a dependency and the mind-only view says that external existence is dependent on being perceived by mind. When no one sees it, the acknowledging mind is missing and therefore the terms and conditions for existence are not complete and therefore it doesn't exist. When you logically trace it, that's where it gets you. When you don't trace it, when you just say, 'if a tree falls and no one sees it fall, it doesn't exist", that sounds funny. But when you really trace existence you will at some point get to that conclusion. We will all buy that point of view. If we didn't read the objection from the other side we would really buy it. There are really convincing points in there.

Today is not the time to clarify that, but I would like to give the viewpoint of Buddhapalita, Chandrakirti and Shantideva to contrast the mind-only view. Buddhapalita, etc. do accept external existence. But the way they accept it is as relatively existing and absolutely not existing.

The beauty of emptiness is that here you can have everything: external, internal, relation, no relation, existence, non-existence. All can be established as it is, without interrupting true reality. Let me read a few lines from Tsongkhapa's Praise to Buddha:

kang ga kye la ra le pa...

Whatever exists, depends on terms and conditions.

Whatever depends on terms and conditions does not truly exist.

How wonderful.

One cannot find anything more beautiful than this statement.

("Whatever depends on conditions

is empty of intrinsic reality?"

What excellent instruction could there be

more marvelous than this discovery?

translation: R. Thurman)

The bottom line of this statement is this: when we say that something does not truly exist that does not mean that it is not there. Things can function. They are there and they are there dependently. If you are truly existing you should not depend on anything. You should be there, simply because you are there. However, you are only there because all the terms and conditions are right.

kyo nyi nam she tong pa nyi...

You who sees the emptiness as essence of interdependent nature

and interdependent nature as the essence of emptiness,

yet you can do and undo everything together, without contradiction,

that is the beauty of your teaching.

If you dont' see this then empty is completely empty and nothing can be done.

When something has been done it can never be changed and it is a done deal.

That makes people suffer.

(Your position is that when one perceives

voidness as the fact of relativity,

such voidness of reality does not preclude

the viability of activity;

whereas when one perceives the opposite,

activity is impossible in voidness,

voidness is lost during activity;

one falls into anxiety's abyss.

translation: R. Thurman)

Nagarjuna also said,

ka la tong pa nyi rung war.....

One who can accept emptiness can accept everything.

One who cannot accept emptiness can accept nothing.

If it is not empty, it is filled up, can't change and is static. There is no change at all. All of this we can see if we can negate the object of negation.

We have been reading page after page about the object of negation. You have to learn this by reading and understanding, but more than that you have to find it by your meditation. Especially, when you cannot find it, when you are truly convinced that it doesn't exist, that is the point where you have negated the object of negation. That is the point where you bust your ego. That is the point where you bust the dualistic viewpoint, which is thinking one thing and doing another thing. That is the point which we call the Third Path, the Path of Seeing.

In the last four sessions we haven't come as far as putting something solid together for you, but we really did look into this wisdom of emptiness. What is it? Where do all the sufferings and pains of the world come from? It is nothing but this object of negation.

I did introduce the object of negation as jig ta. It is translated as reifying view of the perishable aggregates. Tsongkhapa, in the lam rim chenmo, quotes Chandrakirti,

...In their minds, yogis perceive that all afflictions

And all faults arise from the reifying view of the perishing aggregates,

And, knowing that the self is the object of that view,

They refute the self.

If you are a yogi you have to refute the self. That doesn't mean to be selfish or to look down on oneself. What does the reifying view of the perishing aggregates do? It is easier for me to call it jig ta. The jig ta identifies the self within the aggregates. But these aggregates are perishable. Perishable vegetables quickly go bad. We buy them in the frozen food section of the grocery store and they look nice but by the time you get home they start to go bad and the next day they are ready to go into the garbage can. Here we are dealing with the perishable aggregates, like form, sound, smell, taste, touch and so on. Jig ta is holding the self and identifies it with the aggregates which are perishable.

Time goes so quickly, it is surprising. A few days ago I was in a restaurant. I saw somebody I have known since their birth. That person was drinking wine. I was a little surprised and asked, "How old are you?" The person loudly replied, "Twenty-one!" I thought, "Wow, twenty-one years went just like this?" The reifying view of the perishable aggregates has such a hard time to keep things tight. Time is going. The gray hair is coming, the wrinkles are coming, weight is gained and lost. That is why everything gets twisted by the reifying view of the perishable aggregates. It is holding that self and therefore such a self should be refuted.

That basically should give you quite a good understanding of what emptiness is about. We talked about two types of emptiness, the emptiness of self and the emptiness of phenomena other than self. That is because of "my" and "me". These are the most important. "Me" is my body and mind, the perishable aggregates. "Me" is supposed to be inside of that. To see the emptiness of "me" and "my" is the most important. There are so many categories of emptiness, like 108, 51 and 16 emptinesses. For example, in the Yamantaka sadhana you read that the 16 legs are the 16 emptinesses. However, it boils down to the emptiness of "me" and "my". The moment you see these it cuts out all obsession and hatred. You bust the root of all lies. That is the mystery of life revealed. The yogi who can burst that lie also goes beyond the law of physics. That is why you see the mahasiddhas walking through walls and so on. This becomes reality because they can go beyond the laws of physics. It is a side effect of their understanding of emptiness, and so is clairvoyance and other capabilities.

I am going to stop here and wish you a happy summer. In my absence a number of senior students are going to talk about the 12 links of interdependent existence. What makes our life what it is? How did it come about? You can see drawings that show this. This drawing hangs in almost every Tibetan temple. We have one in Jewel Heart too. The former Gaden Tripa donated to us when he visited here in his capacity of Chang jen Cho je, before he was Gaden Tripa. This drawing is a map of the realms of existence, including gods, demi-gods, humans, hungry ghosts, animals and hell beings. In the center of the drawing is a circle where everything comes from. In it there is a snake, a cock and pig. They are circling around each other and eating each other. They are depictions of the three poisons. The pig is ignoracne. The snake is hatred and the cock or rooster is obsession. Then there are the 6 realms of existence and they are held together by the outer rim of the 12 links, the 12 different events that make sure the individual takes one rebirth after another in samsara.

(You have have heard that I am teaching in Ann Arbor on Sep 3-5 on the Secret aspects of the Gaden Lha gyema. The main day will be Saturday). Normally this is a little restricted by needing a prior initiation, but I don't want to put too much restriction, because otherwise we can't do much. So it is going to be open.

When we are not meeting here, in the meantime I always emphasize: be a nice person, be a little compassionate, less selfish than you normally are, a little more caring and loving, for yourself and others. If you have no compassion for yourself, try to develop some. Don't do something that harms you, physically, mentally or emotionally. Be happy to have the opportunity to kick the bucket of samsara. Really true. You have that opportunity. I don't mean you are going to die! Actually, you will die, for sure, but not immediately. So you have the opportunity to kick the bucket of samsara which we never kicked.

© 2005, Gehlek Rimpoche, All Rights Reserved

20050913GRAABODHI9 PART IV

Welcome, everybody. During the break since the last class, a number of things have happened in Jewel Heart. Some people have been able to do some good work, such as nice retreats, prostrations and circumambulations. We also had a very interesting weekend talking about Ganden Lha Gyema guru-yoga with the special ear-whispered teachings. The whispered teachings were taught by loudspeaker! Also His Holiness the Dalai Lama is in the country and doing great things. On the one side, these are all wonderful things.

On the other side, we all personally saw the natural disaster from hurricane Katrina, and the tremendous amount of suffering that took place within our own country, with our own people. This most powerful and economically advanced nation in the world also suffers from natural disasters, and not only do we suffer, we even don’t know how to respond immediately!

Such a tremendous amount of suffering has come for a huge number of people, particularly really poor people. If you think about how it was for them, they were told to evacuate, they knew they had to leave; but where could they go, how could they go? No money, no place to go, it was impossible. Watching the news, we all experienced this tremendous pain since the hurricane. It is good news that the loss of lives may not be as high as estimated earlier. However, we don’t exactly know how many really lost their lives.

To me, this disaster we all saw is a vivid example or demonstration of the truth of suffering. According to the Buddha, the four noble truths are the principle how we function in our lives, and what we are. There are two negative truths, then two positive truths. The first noble truth is the truth of suffering. Sometimes our suffering is vivid, sometimes it is indirect, however, we all have that first noble truth. The hurricane and flooding is a vivid example of the first noble truth.

It can happen in the most powerful and wealthy nation in the world. We cannot deny that’s what we are: the richest, most powerful, most scientifically and militarily advanced country in the world. However, here also how many rotten things are happening, like the homeless in New York. This disaster clearly shows how many poor people were crammed together in the low-lying land in New Orleans. I presume that the low-lying areas were the cheapest because no one wanted to live with the threat of flooding.

In a way, this hurricane not only brought suffering, but it also exposed what we hide, the many poorest members of our society, the economically challenged people. When you’re economically challenged, then you are challenged in everything, including health, right? The tragedy of all these poor people crammed in one area has been shown throughout the world.

All this is extremely painful way not only for those who lost their lives, or their loved ones, but also for all of us when we are watching. Although we are watching through television, we felt and experienced the pain, we all share the pain.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama said on Larry King Live that what happened is karmic. Definitely, no doubt, it is karmic, because if there’s no cause there’s no result. When there’s a cause, the result is bound to come. From that angle, definitely it is karmic.

But sometimes people can misunderstand this. Whenever we say something is karmic, people think it is the fault of those who suffered. If you make the statement that it is the fault of the victims, I can categorically tell you here that His Holiness didn’t say that, and it is not true. I emphasize this, because sometimes it sounds like ‘blame the victim’, and it’s not that. I would like you to know that very clearly: it is not blaming the victim at all.

It is karma, the karma of not only those who lost their lives or loved ones, but the karma of all of us together. We all feel the pain, how sad, miserable, and horrible it is. You yourself know what your feelings were during this periods. We all experience the pain and suffering, some more, some less, but whatever it may be, we all shared this. It is all our common and specific karmic consequence, for sure.

That is why all first noble truths are karmic consequences. That suffering is what we don’t want. We all know that very clearly, so we must do whatever we can to help, support and assist the people there, spiritually and emotionally as well as physically and materially. We must translate our compassion also into practical actions.

It is a great thing to meditate on compassion and offer our compassion mentally. However, it needs to be practically implemented. I was very happy to hear that a number of people from Jewel Heart wanted to physically go there and help. Whether you literally are able to go or not, the thought of going there and sharing is a wonderful thing and I really appreciate and thank you.

If you try to go, you will also have different conditions and difficulties, too. Particularly now, when finally the great Army of the United States is involved, any individuals wanting to do anything will not be able to do much because they have every kind of equipment and can pick everybody up within a matter of hours.

We must find our own practical way of helping. We are a very small and poor organization, yet we hope to raise at least $10,000, for the Salvation Army. Our former director, Marilyn Hall, has taken charge of that; and already has set up a website with the Salvation Army, so you can go there and support through your donations, whatever you can afford. I believe the email is going out today. I heard that other Dharma centers are also raising donations, and some of them already raised $100,000 on behalf of His Holiness.

In addition, Jewel Heart also hopes to build at least one house for those victims who have been relocated in Michigan in conjunction with Habitat for Humanity. All the Midwest Jewel Heart chapters will combine together and physically as well as financially, whenever we find the opportunity, build at least one home for one family to be able to relocate and live there. Some of them may be living here a long time. Some of them may even live their whole life here, who knows?

So that’s what we hope to do, and it is giving us an opportunity to be able to do a practical translation of compassion, going one step beyond sending our good thoughts, sort of physically, literally to be able to translate that meditative compassion into action. I hope everybody will take the great opportunity and join these efforts.

You may be thinking that we are doing too many things. Some of you may think it is very important to work with the mind, and not so important to work with the physical. This is not true. Working with the mind is, of course, important, yet you have to be there physically, and literally as well. You cannot be tremendously generous mentally and tremendously stingy literally, not even wanting to spend a penny. That will not work. Even if the motivations and actual thoughts may be wonderful dharma actions, if the dharma action of the motivation and mental activity cannot translate into practical terms, then that is not right.

Look at the stories of earlier lineage masters, how generous they have been in practicing the three kinds of generosity. Number one is the generosity of dharma. In Buddhist language, dharma means spiritual, so this generosity means sharing your knowledge and experience. When you share with people, you assist, guide and support them. This is what we try to do as our major work in Jewel Heart. We share whatever little information we have, compared with such a huge, vast amount of information within Buddhism. Buddhist information is based on experience, on experienced development. So whatever tiny little bit it might be, maybe just a drop from an ocean, whatever we could pick up from the great traditions of Buddhism, of the Mahayana, of Vajrayana and of the Tibetan Ganden-Kagyu tradition, we share this.

We bring whatever we consider pure, like refined gold, solid, \ experiential living tradition through teaching, courses, sangha activities, and various things. We are using every possible means, electronically and technologically and also in the good old way of person to person. We are trying to do this in every way we can. Not only we are making it available to those who come in the door of Jewel Heart, but we are also getting ourself out there, putting it out through transcripts, through the Internet, through all these methods, including even going into the prisons and to try to assist them, try to show them how to meditate and bring a little peace and harmony within themselves even within the four walls of the prison. We also assist members of Jewel Heart in their spiritual practice by providing retreats, meditations, and so on. That is one way we are acting as generosity, out of dharma generosity. I may not have mentioned many other things that we do.

Not only Jewel Heart as a group, but each and every one of these present or past members who have had to move separately to some other areas also set up individual examples of how one conducts a good life. One of these was Michael Felt, a member of Jewel Heart here who relocated to Tennessee. He was an example in that local community, showing how one maintains peace within oneself, within the individual. He was the example, showing what little things he picked up here. He didn’t go out and say, “Hey, listen, I want to teach Buddhism!” He conducted his life that way. We have a number of people like this in quite a number of areas. Unfortunately, Michael passed away through an accident of falling from a roof, so I’m sorry. We pray for him and also dedicate our virtues that we individually as well as collectively accumulated over the years through our life for his benefit.

When I say benefit, it means two things. One, to purify his negativities; and two, so that he connects with his good karma and as a result of that takes future rebirth in a good, great human life, better than what he had earlier, and also comes back home with his all connections with the dharma teachings. Not only comes back home, but completes whatever work he is doing and lead millions of people through that path. That’s what we pray for when we say we are praying for his benefit: it means these two things.

The second kind of generosity is the actual literal, physical act called generosity. Not just mental, not just meditative. Whatever you meditate, you will be able to translate that in a literal sense to share whatever little extra resources you have. Maybe instead of wasting money on a pack of cigarettes or a joint or a glass of wine, you may be able to use it for useful things like generosity without feeling much of a pinch. Most people here don’t have much of a financial cushion, as we all know. Almost everybody is living sort of between hand and mouth, but when you look into it, you have extra change, extra money for this and that. You don’t really need cigarettes, which are bad for you, for everybody else, and for the environment. You don’t really need intoxicants, which are bad for you, bad for others, and which bring bad habits.

A funny old story in the Tibetan teaching system tells of a person who claimed to be a spiritual practitioner like us. Maybe he was a little bit better than us because he maintained holy gestures, wearing red robes and carrying a mala in his hand. These are the signs of holiness, remember? We did that, in the sixties with long hair like mine, maybe even much longer than that.

While this fellow was sitting and praying, somebody said to him, “Well, I’ve got three choices for you. I have a goat here. Would you like to kill this goat so we can have a nice dinner? Or would you like to rape this beautiful woman? Or would you drink this intoxicating alcohol?”

The guy said, “No, no, no, I can’t rape a woman. I’m a monk. No, no, no, I can’t kill the goat because this is a living being and I’m a compassionate person. Intoxication, yeah, that’s something I can adjust to, so OK.” He picked that bottle up and drank it and by the time he woke up, he’d done both of the two other things! That’s what intoxication does.

Therefore, intoxication is not necessary for us. It is an infectious disease. “Not only do I like to do it, I like to make others to join me. Not only do I like to spoil my life, I’d like to spoil your life as well.” That’s what I mean by an infectious disease. That is unless you know what you’re doing with this. If you are using the marijuana as a medicine for certain purposes, I’m not sure whether that’s legal or not, but personally I might not have that much objection. What I mean is, that if you know what you are doing, or if you have a high spiritual development and you can utilize that for your better purposes, it is beyond my judgment.

Other than that, in normal circumstances intoxication is not necessary. It is an additional expense when you don’t have money to begin with. It is unnecessary, and I am talking about all this because of generosity. What not to be generous with is that one, because generosity must have its own wisdom to decide what should be and what should not be. It is wonderful to share a nickel with the person who is begging or demanding in the street. It’s wonderful, provided it is helpful and a service to that person. If it’s going to harm the person, then the wisdom of the generosity will tell you not to do it.

I’m going to say something here which may disappoint many of you. This is about me and me alone, my and my alone. When somebody begs me for something, even if I know it is not good for that person, I’ll make sure that person knows it is not good for them, but if even then they still want it, I’ll give it. That’s me and me only, not Buddha, not Buddhism, not Tibetan Buddhism, not Gelugpa tradition, nothing. It’s me, and that’s what I do. It’s maybe my weakness, maybe how I read generosity, whatever it may be. I know it’s not good, I know it’s not right, even then I do give it. I don’t mean you should do it. You have to make your own decision using your wisdom.

This second generosity is doing the literal things, like giving support to the hurricane victims. This is one example and we just had the fourth anniversary of 9/11. All of these happened within the United States. Outside the US, every day a tremendous amount of suffering is going on, everywhere, in Africa, in Asia, in Afghanistan, in Iraq. In Iraq it is a man-made disaster going on, killing going on all sides, everybody killing everybody. Suffering is going on everywhere, yet somehow, when it comes all the time, it’s no longer news, we no longer pay attention.

Even with me, whenever I used to hear how many people were killed each day in Iraq, it hurt. After you have heard that every day for years, then when you hear that 30 died today, you think “Oh, not so much. It’s not so bad.” This is how our mind responds to something continuing, this is how our compassion works, so it’s not very good. “OK, 30 is not so bad.” Actually, 30 people lost most precious thing that person ever had. You can lose nothing more than your life. That’s what it is.

When you are literally helping, apply whatever you are meditating on – generosity, morality, patience, enthusiasm, concentration, wisdom –to this action. One good thing that comes out of unfortunate events is that it gives us an additional opportunity to be able to get in touch with our heart and our compassion, compassion that has been actually implemented in the literal sense of whatever we can do, like giving medicine, food, shelter, and so on. This is the literal generosity, and we should do that.

The third and most important generosity is giving protection from fear. Fear is always the dominating, most tormenting pain that we all experience. We are born with it, die with it, and it follows us throughout. Sometimes it is huge, sometimes little, but it’s always there, hiding sometimes as cautions, sometimes as a warning, sometimes as a threat, and it’s always tormenting us. The biggest pain and suffering we have is fear.

Protecting from fear is the most important generosity, and the most threatening fear is the threat to life. The biggest threat you can say is, “I’ll kill you!” Right? You can do nothing more than that. No one can threaten anyone by saying, “I will take you to hell!” At the most they may say, “I will see you in hell,” they may say that. No one can do anything beyond killing you. No Buddha can take you to hell, and no god can take you to hell. The biggest threat anyone can make is, “I’ll kill you. You will suffer. You will lose your life.” That’s the biggest threat.

Therefore, the biggest generosity against fear is saving a life. Saving the life of a fellow human being is the most important generosity. Whenever people are in danger of losing their lives, if we can work against that, in whatever way we can, it is a tremendous dharma practice. In addition to that, we add our usual our motivation and usual dedication; if you do it like that, saving a human life is a tremendous spiritual work.

Saving a life is giving protection, and not only a human life, other lives too, the lives of animals, even insects. It is the generosity of protection of fear, not only through meditation, but actually giving protection.

That is also an act of compassion, an act of the bodhisattva way of functioning. With even one action like this, so many things are involved! The compassion that we share, the protection that we try to give as generosity is a great practice for us. Practice is not limited to meditation. Practice is not limited to saying mantras, or saying prayers. Saving a human life and so forth are the real practice.

I began with saying that there are three generosities, so this is third generosity, saving a life. If you save a human life, it has more value because human beings have more value than animals. I’m not saying we are better, but human beings have more opportunity than animals. If you kill a human being, the negativity of killing a human being is greater than the negativity of killing an elephant, although an elephant is bigger than a human being. That’s why saving a human life is the most important thing. When you are engaged in the first generosity, the generosity of helping the victims, this will also include saving lives as well together with this, and this is a very, very good way of practice.

It is my fault that I did not emphasize this in Jewel Heart much earlier. We don’t have a big organization which helps and supports refugee here and there. We just have a tiny little project supporting an orphanage in Tibet, providing them with lunch. Half good, half bad because of circumstances, Jewel Heart has been running this project and it is still going on. We have put about $50,000 towards that. We also have the occasionally functioning, occasionally not functioning depending on who is handling it, support of young incarnate lama. Other than that we don’t run refugee aid here and there, like many other dharma centers do. That’s partly my fault.

An occasion like this, right in front of our noses, is an opportunity for us to be able to function and give help and support. Although I am supposed to be talking to you continuously about Shantideva’s wisdom chapter, I think this is an important point that I needed to share with you.

***********

Next week I won’t be here on Tuesday because I have been asked to participate in a conference with His Holiness in Houston. I’ve been told Thurman and me and two scientists who are Nobel Prize winners will be on a panel to entertain for a whole day. I don’t even know what the subject is, but I’ll be there, so pray for me not to be a disgrace! If I remember correctly, Tony will talk next Tuesday class continuing with the sixth link of the twelve links of independent arising.

As I have said previously, I have personally selected each and every one of the Jewel Heart instructors. Each and every one of them has spent years with me.

You people are lucky, and I’ll tell you why. One of our first Tibetan Buddhist teachers was Geshe Wangyal, who taught Robert Thurman, Jeffrey Hopkins and many others, and started the Tibetan Learning Center in New Jersey. Geshe-la was commonly known as the “holy horror.” He yelled constantly and showed a tremendous temper. Geshe-la yelled at me three or four times, even though I had nothing to do with Geshe-la.

One time in 1964 I came as a visiting student to Cornell up in Ithaca. I didn’t even speak a word of English, not even “yes” and “no.” Geshe-la invited me to dinner, and made big arrangements at his monastery. Geshe-la probably was that I would come wearing a monk’s robe, but on the contrary, I had a nice two-piece suit and tie, and nice boots. Geshe-la, standing with a scarf to receive me, looked at me and said, “Look at you! What do you think you are, a monkey walking through the temple?!” He yelled at me straight away for a long, long time. Then he gave me a very nice dinner, no doubt about it. At the end of that, he gave me $200. That was a lot of money for 1964 especially when you are a refugee student from Tibet and you have nothing. I think I totally owned $20.

The second time I saw him, Geshe-la said, “Now you are not monk anyway, so you better stay in the United States afterwards.” I said sort of OK, but didn’t say yes completely. Next he said, “I give an allowance to all these dharma teachers each month to buy their soap and toothpaste.” I forget how much, maybe $25 or something. Then he said. “But I will give you $500 if you stay!” I didn’t really agree to it, and I left.

Then Geshe Lobzang Tharchin (unfortunately both he and Geshe Wangyal have now passed away) who is the Khen Rimpoche Lobzang Tharchin who had a center in New Jersey and was the teacher of Michael Roach. He also knew Geshe Wangyal, and so he told me, “Don’t stay with him. He will yell at you all the time and you will not reply, you will sit there smiling. I know your character, you will sit there smiling, and he will yell at you morning till evening. You won’t like that, so don’t go. The $500 he wants to give you is good, but you will make more than $5,000 a month. Don’t stay there, don’t stay there!” So anyway, so I didn’t.

Geshe Wangyal-la got so mad! The next time I saw him was at the Buddhist conference in New Delhi arranged by the Mahabodhi Society. The moment he saw me in the conference he said, “You! You don’t want to stay with me! But I’ve got better than you! I’ve got Denmo Locho!” which means Locho Rimpoche. He probably asked Locho Rimpoche, and Locho Rimpoche probably said, “Eh…” and did not really say yes. But he yelled, “I’ve got better than you! I’ve got Denmo Locho for me! I told you I would give you more money than I give anybody else! You didn’t come!” He was yelling at me at the conference, actually right across the table. Instead of saying, “How are you? How have you been?” he said that!

That Geshe-la was a holy horror, well known for that. After he shouted at you, there was no more problem, he was very happy. He gave me an overcoat, literally stitched by his own hands. He made me sort of a brownish-looking overcoat, a beautiful woolen thing and that really fit me perfectly. But then in his system, that was probably an honor or something. His students told me later, because he gave one or two people some coats and something to wear. One of his students, Diana, (Diana is another holy horror, too!) wears a coat when she is teaching. Geshe-la gave her that or something, that’s how I came to know later. But anyway, as I was saying, you people are lucky, I sit there and smile or whatever. Whatever you people do, I was not a holy horror! I’m happy with that.

These Jewel Heart teachers have studied with me and even now they try to help you other people, the new ones coming in and so forth. We have a check and balance system, and we always check them for accuracy, which is most important. When they teach, we make two DVD’s – one we give to the teacher, and one I get and review it for accuracy. We also emphasize the art of presentation, and good preparation for classes. These teachers are good, I stand behind them, and we also have this check and balance system. Some dharma facilitators are becoming dharma instructors, and some new people are becoming dharma facilitators. Our programs are running very well. We need everybody to participate and join together.

That’s what I would like to share with you. So next Tuesday I won’t be here, but you will have the sixth link of the twelve links.

We have a lot of exciting programs coming over the next few months. For example, we have a Tara Blessing in New York on the 28th of September. If you saw the New York Times a few Sundays ago, the arts section carried a big article with a Tara picture. I was interviewed for that along with the Rubin Museum. We are looking forward to having this Tara Blessing and I will also be speaking in the Rubin Museum itself on Monday, November 14th, in conjunction with an exhibition of Female Buddhas.

Then we have Philip Glass coming to Ann Arbor and doing a concert for Jewel Heart on November 9th at Michigan Theater, and that is exciting.

This Saturday, Robert Thibodeau will give a workshop on Buddhism and astrology. As we know, Robert is very good with predictions. One of the predictions he made was very scary for me. During one Jewel Heart Retreat he was giving a talk, and then suddenly started giving predictions saying, “If I were you, I wouldn’t put my foot in a plane today and tomorrow.” The next morning, I saw on television that a plane had crashed. He is good at that. He was also right about George Bush and wrong, too, but that happens.

Also, Geshe Khen Rimpoche Lobzang Tsetan is also coming in November and teaching the Three Principles at Jewel Heart Ann Arbor.

The weekend before that, Glen Mullin is coming to do a Friday talk here in Jewel Heart followed by a whole day workshop on Saturday. His presentations have very exciting titles. It is tantra and it is the joy, bliss, sex and all that within tantra.

I guess that’s it. I’d better stop because I’ve been telling everybody to be on time, start on time, finish on time, and I’m the one who is breaking all my own rules!

[END]

20051011GRAABODHI9

Good evening everybody. Welcome here tonight. We are in the middle of the teaching on the Bodhisattvacharyavatara, the Bodhisattvas' Way of Life. Bodhisattva is a term used in Buddhism for those who are working towards becoming a Buddha. We have to be aware that not every Buddhist tradition introduces buddhahood as their goal. If you look into the Theravadan tradition, their maximum achievement of the spiritual practice is to become an "arhat'. Their level is known as nirvana, meaning freedom from the cycle of life after life of suffering, a continuous running cycle of death, bardo and birth. It keeps on continuing, without control. That is called samsara. In Tibetan it is known as kor wa. That literally means circling, because kor lo means wheel. What is circling here? The individual is bouncing from birth to death, to bardo and to the next birth and so on. That is actually the idea of reincarnation.

I am coming from the background of reincarnation. My background is Tibetan Buddhism. Tibetan Buddhism, and actually all Buddhism, does accept reincarnation. A number of people may think that reincarnation is something great and desirable. We talk about incarnate lamas. The true reality is that reincarnation is not great at all. Nagarjuna, the great Indian scholar, has said,

Try not to have reincarnation. You can achieve nothing better than that.

Does that mean that the individual is discontinued if you can stop reincarnation? I don't think that is correct. We don't discontinue. The lives continue. The beings continue. They may not necessarily be human beings all the time. Beings continue under the control of suffering or in a peaceful or joyful nature. This is the true question. When talking about samsara we talk about beings continuing in suffering. It is no secret to us that our present life is full of tremendous amounts of suffering. We may think that we are great and wonderful. We are Americans, the richest nation in the world, the most scientifically advanced in the world, the greatest military and economic power in the world. Absolutely true, and yet we continue to suffer. Our society is indeed very advanced scientifically, which has made our life much easier than it used to be, even decades ago. However, we continue to suffer. We had 9/11. We endured Hurricane Katrina and other hurricanes thereafter. Now we just had a huge earthquake. I heard in the news today that there are over 30,000 casualties. That is in Pakistan alone. In India there are at 1800 dead and the number is bound to go up.

When we are sitting here, talking about Dharma, saying prayers and so on, we should dedicate our positive virtues to those who unfortunately experience directly the first Noble Truth in the worst way, by losing their lives. Remember, I often say that when these kinds of incidents happen in the world it is no fault of ours, nor is it the fault of anyone else, or God's fault. It is as Buddha has said: the Truth of Suffering in a very vivid way. Losing one's life is the worst expression of the First Noble Truth. As spiritual practitioners we should dedicate all our positive virtues so that all those who died can purify all negativities and connect with their positive karmas and take proper rebirth. We should do that not only with regard to the earthquake in the India/Kashmir/Pakistan area, but also by thinking about the mudslides in Guatemala and coming close to home, the death of our member Dennis Gilligan from Cleveland. He passed away yesterday, at around 2 pm. I received a request to pray and actually I heard that he passed away very peacefully and nicely. Our Cleveland Dharma coordinator Anne Warren was present at the time and was doing Avalokiteshvara prayers and the long mantra OM NAMO RATNA TRAYAYA…Then, she said, somehow she had to switch to the guru mantra and at that moment he breathed his last. She thought that went very well and I thought so too. So he passed away not only very peacefully, but with a mind connected to Guru, Buddha and so on. Buddha has guaranteed that if you die in that way you will not fall into lower realms in your next life.

It is good to take that into account. But it doesn't mean that we don't have to pray any more. We still need to dedicate our virtues of studying and praying, all our usual prayers and so on, to firstly purify all negativities and secondly, to make a positive karmic connection. When you breathe your last while being connected to Buddha and Guru and saying mantras, you will be able to connect with a good life, but such a good life also should have the 10 endowments and 8 leisures, so that you can continue the dharma practice and obtain enlightenment in that very next life time. That is what we owe to our members. Teacher and students are putting together their thoughts and energy and dedicate it to those purposes in general, to those who lost their lives in the disasters and particularly to Dennis Gilligan.

We are talking about samsara and about what makes samsara continue and what makes samsara continue is the ego, nothing else but ego. What can cut samsara? It is nothing but wisdom. In this case it is the wisdom understanding reality. In the Buddhist tradition we call that "emptiness". We are talking about what emptiness refutes. We are talking about the object of negation.

When you throw out a glass of water, you say that now the glass is empty. Different earlier scholars have different thoughts on that. We have just come to the Mind Only School's way of thinking about that. Their idea of emptiness is the emptiness of an external identity - not only external existence, but external identity. We have been talking about the debate between Mind Only and Madhyamaka. Last time we have covered the verses 16-19. Yes, I can continue to read on. However, I would like to do something different at this point. Last week in Garrison I did a teaching on the Four Mindfulnesses. The moment you talk about the four mindfulnesses, most people will say, "Yes, I know about that. It is the mindfulness of body, feelings, mind and phenomena". These are the four mindfulnesses that come up in the context of the 37 wings of enlightenment. However, the set of four mindfulnesses we covered in the teachings last week end is something else.

This set of four mindfulnesses is a secret teaching given to Je Tsongkhapa by Manjushri himself. I do remember, I always experience some uneasiness when I hear the term "Lama Tsongkhapa", though some Tibetan teachers themselves use that term. If you are really thinking about "lama" in the sense of being a guru or so on it is okay. But often we think of a lama as somebody who wears red robes. It is a little uneasy to think about Tsongkhapa in that way. That uneasiness was confirmed when I reread the transcripts of Kyabje Ling Rimpoche's teachings on the Four Mindfulnesses. He kept on referring to Je Tsongkhapa and never said Lama Tsongkapa. I remember he actually told me that he doesn't like the term "Lama Tsongkhapa". In Tibetan he really used kam sum cho gye gyal po Tsongkhapa Chen po, which means: the great Tsongkhapa, the dharma king of the three kinds of existence.

So, in this set of the four mindfulnesses, the first is the mindfulness of the guru, the second is the mindfulness of compassion and bodhicitta, the third is the mindfulness of the divine body and then lastly the mindfulness of emptiness. I don't want to repeat here everything I taught in Garrison last week end, however, since we are talking about wisdom here, I want to bring in some of the important points concerning emptiness from that teaching. This was a teaching given by Kyabje Ling Rimpoche, which has been translated into English at that very time and then transcribed. There were a number of professors present at that time. So I would like to go through some of the most important points of that teaching.

The advantage is that this condensed teaching gives you some good idea about emptiness. When we talk about the object of negation, sometimes it is good to talk in extreme detail, in an almost extravagant way. At that time it may seem that the subject is scattered all over the world and there is nothing to hold. A condensed teaching, on the other hand, like this one by Kyabje Ling Rimpoche, gives you something to hold. I would like to bring something from that teaching to you, though it may be redundant to those of you who attended that teaching in Garrison. I think it will be helpful. Whenever I do something nice anywhere I like to bring it back home and try to share it with you people here.

So let me read a little bit from that transcript about the Fourth Mindfulnesses. This teaching of Manjushri to Tsongkhapa was put into words by the Seventh Dalai Lama in form of a song. The translation does not really do justice to the original words, but it is better than nothing.

The Seventh Dalai Lama says

Throughout the circle of appearing and occurring objects of knowledge pervades the space of clear light which is reality, the ultimate, an inexpressible mode of being of objects is there.

Forsaking mental fabrications, look to the entity of immaculate emptiness,

not letting your mind stray, place it within reality,

making your attention unforgetful, maintain it within reality.

Then, according to the translator, Kyabje Rimpoche explains,

Now for the fourth contemplation…...

The translator keeps on using the term contemplation, but actually, it is mindfulness, because the title of the Seventh Dalai Lama's Song itself is "Song of the Four Mindfulnesses" and also Kyabje Rimpoche said 'mindfulness'. The translator probably thought that to use the word mindfulness would cause confusion with regard to the other set of the four mindfulnesses and therefore chose the term contemplation. However, in Tibetan the same terminology for the different teachings has been used purposely. This Song of the Four Mindfulnesses is a little bit secret. So when we use the same title people will ignore it, thinking, "Oh, I know what the four mindfulnesses are". And they won't be too interested in looking at this teaching. That is how you can keep teachings secret.

At first, Tsongkhapa's secret teachings were kept separately at the end of one volume. Later, the editors took all these secret teachings apart and distributed them all over the 18th volume, one verse here in this chapter, one verse there in another chapter. That is how the Tibetans keep things secret.

That reminds me that once there was a very nice geshe from Ganden Changtse monastery. He unfortunately died. Otherwise he would have been the Ganden Tripa by now, no doubt. He was working in Tibet House. In those days money was very rare. The Tibetan monasteries in the early refugee days in India were not yet organized and so if there was any money coming in they would give it to some reliable person for safekeeping. I used to keep money for Gyuto too. So Geshe-la kept some money for Ganden Changtse. Then suddenly he got sick with cancer. By the time he realized it was cancer it was too late. He died within three, four days. He started hiccupping and died very soon. When I got there, he was still alive and he told me, "You will find some money in my garbage, which belongs to Ganden Changtse." It was close to 100,000 rupees. The monastery had asked him to keep it for them. So he made little bundles of bank notes and kept them in his garbage can. He swept his floor and put the garbage on top of the money. It was in a garbage bag. So when he died I told the Ganden Changtse monks, "Your money is in the garbage." Incidentally, I remember that some people keep money in their boots, but when the boots are gone, the money is gone as well. But the garbage is safe. No thief will take your garbage!

The Four Mindfulnesses are purposely called the same as the usual Four Mindfulnesses, so most people will ignore it. Now let me read from Kaybje Ling Rimpoche's teaching

Now for the fourth contemplation, of Emptiness or Shunyata, the first lines refer to the fact that anything within the realm of samsara or nirvana, all that can be known or perceived is pervaded by Emptiness.

In other words, emptiness is pervasive. Every animate or inanimate object, whatever we see, is in the nature of emptiness.

The nature of all things, without any exception, is that they lack true existence. Just as there is no place which is not pervaded by the sky in space, there is no place not pervaded by Emptiness.

Inexpressible mode of being" means a fully-realized Arya's understanding of emptiness cannot be described in any words, and it cannot be explained how such an Arya arrived at that understanding. It says: "Forsaking mental fabrications, look to the entity of immaculate Emptiness". In order to understand Emptiness we have to understand its nature. Emptiness is egolessness; we have to understand what is being refuted, otherwise, "Emptiness" gives rise to many intellectual misconceptions and misunderstandings. We must eliminate wrong concepts, and mental fabrications concerning Emptiness. Shunyata, egolessness, etc. are synonymous. What is egolessness? The lack of a self-existing or truly independent "bdag" or ego. So there is the lack of true existence of the ego in terms of personality. In this realm there are many other things apart from personalities or persons: there are phenomena, and their lack of true or natural existence is called the egolessness of phenomena, while the lack of true or natural existence of the ego is called egolessness.

For those who don't know, Kyabje Ling Rimpoche is the senior guru or master of the present Dalai Lama. He gave this teaching in New Dehli, in Tibet House. It is better than what I have been saying, so what he says here is that there are two types of emptiness, one is self-lessness, the other is phenomena-lessness. In Tibetan these are kang sar gyi dag me and cho gyi dag me, the selflessness of person and the selflessness of phenomena.

We touch on that very often in our current Tuesday and Thursday teachings. Chandrakirti also stated that

Buddha has divided emptiness into two categories, based on the animate and on the inanimate

In other words, emptiness is based on beings and all things other than beings, like tables and glasses. This is important to recognize. Even though emptiness is emptiness, you have to see them as different, because for some individual people it is easier to recognize the emptiness of persons and for some it is easier to understand the emptiness of phenomena. That is why it is important to distinguish both of them. Otherwise, it is like in the example of the yak that has only one eye and while enjoying the beautiful grass growing in high altitude with pure air and pure water, it will only see the grass on one side and the grass on the other side will be left. Therefore, both are necessary. Some people may think, "Truth is truth, there is only one truth", but in Buddhism we tell you, "No, there are two truths."

To continue with Kyabje Rimpoche's teaching:

To establish this understanding there are many methods and forms of reasoning. The two main methods are: a) the separation of one and many; and b) dependent arising, which is called the king of reasoning. The separation of one and many has four points:

(1) ascertaining the object to be refuted,

This is necessary to figure out because not every "I" is to be refuted. There are some "I"s that have to be refuted and some that have to be maintained.

(2) establishing the pervasion,

(3) one, and

(4) Many.

When we talk about egolessness we have to determine what it is that is 'less'. The term in Tibetan is "bdagmed"-no ego- so we have to determine what is "bdag" ego? What is it that we are trying to refute? If you saw a thief and noticed that he was wearing clothes of a certain color, then you can recognize him again and point him out to the police. It is extremely important to understand what one is refuting. There are two types of ego and one is valid. If we deny the one that is valid we will find ourselves in the position of being nihilists, denying everything, which is a very serious mistake. The ego that is valid has functions, it is the relative ego, and we must be careful not to deny its functions. It is said that those of very small wisdom can fail by making this mistake. When we speak of the Madhyamika philosophy, 'madhya' refers to a middle path, between nihilism and externalism, a path without extremes. If you have a narrow path, you have to walk very carefully without falling to the right or left, between the mistakes of nihilism and mental fabrication, externalism. When Shakyamuni Buddha became Enlightened in Bodhgaya he spent a week without saying anything, as he felt it would be too difficult for people to understand him. He said: "I have discovered an indescribable teaching on Voidness. It is extremely profound and vast, and will be very difficult for people to be able to understand". Then he wandered off into the woods for forty-nine days, and only started to teach later at the request of Brahma and Indra.

You might have heard this: Buddha said,

I found something very profound and vast. If I try to explain it to anyone, nobody will be able to understand. Therefore I choose to keep my mouth shut and remain in the forest.

Indra and Brahma are Hindu gods. Buddhists also accept them. They went to Buddha and urged him to teach by saying, "Why did you become a Buddha, if you want to keep quiet? Please share your experience." In making that request, Indra gave Buddha a golden chakra, a wheel, and Brahma gave him a conch shell. So the wheel has become a very important symbol since then. Also the conch shell is a powerful symbol for giving teachings. You blow on it and it makes a sound.

Kyabje Rimpoche continues,

So there are two types of ego, one which exists and one which doesn't. How are we to recognize them? The false self appears as something which is independent of, or apart from, the five aggregates. For instance, when we are falsely accused of being thieves, we immediately get angry; thinking "Why am I being accused?"

I think the translator added a few words here. Kyabje Rimpoche uses this example very often and Pabongka used it and many great masters in the past have. When you really want to know what your ego is, imagine a situation where you are sitting with a couple of people and all of a sudden someone walks in and points the finger at you and shouts, "You are a thief". First you may think it is a joke but when you realize the accusation is serious you will feel, "Me? A thief?" The sense of "Me" that you feel then is somebody very solid, with big horns, standing inside of you. This is a glimpse of the ego that needs to be refuted.

Another example is this: you are standing at the edge of a huge cliff and you are about to fall. You then think, "Oh my God, I am going to fall". There is a very strong "I" or ego that appears to you at that moment. This strong ego not only appears when you are falsely accused or in great danger but also when you are very upset and angry. Behind that anger, the powerful force is that ego. At other times you may feel deprived of something that you felt entitled to. You think, "I have been denied my promotion." "I have been bypassed." What pops up in all those situations is the ego that is to be refuted.

[Kyabje Ling Rimpoche]

Without thinking of the five aggregates we get a strong feeling of '1'. This is a small taste of the false self, the one to be refuted. When we get this feeling of a strong 'I' without any relation to the base of the five aggregates, since the five are the basis of the self, we have to conclude that there is no such thing as this independent and natural false self as we feel there to be.

In other words: when we see the independent self or "Me" we have to conclude that this is not there.

[Kyabje Ling Rimpoche]

So we have to analyze and establish logically whether it exists as one with the five aggregates or separate from them, i.e. whether it is the same entity or separate. If this false self exists independently, if it has natural existence as one with the five aggregates, as the same entity, then there must be five selves, since they are inseparable from the five aggregates.

If it truly exists as one with the five aggregates, means it must be existing truly, inseparably, as oneness. If that is so, there are five aggregates, so there must be five selves. Plus there are the four elements. So there should be four further selves. There should be nine selves within me. Does anyone of us accept that we have nine different personalities within us? Everyone will say, "I have no split personality. I am me." That shows that the self does not truly exist as oneness with the aggregates and elements. Otherwise there should be nine selves.

[Kyabje Ling Rimpoche]

Here there is the fault that there cannot be five aggregates as there is only one self. The basis of the five aggregates and self are not independently self-existent one. You can understand this by thinking of what happens at death-the form aggregate is left behind and disposed of. Is the self burned or buried along with the body?

If the self exists in oneness with the aggregates, totally inseparable from them, what happens if one of them, the form aggregate, dies? The physical form will be cremated, buried or fed to the birds. So then, does the self disappear, if the aggregates are destroyed?

[Kyabje Ling Rimpoche]

If so, the self would disappear at the same time as the body. So here there is the fault of denying that the ego continues on to future lives. In short there isn't an ego that doesn't rely on the five aggregates.

If we say that the naturally existing or independently existing self is separate from the five aggregates, then there would be no relation whatsoever between the two, but that is not the case. When we are hurt, we don't say: "Oh! Someone stuck a needle into my form aggregate!" -we say: "Someone stuck a needle into me!" The reference is not to the body aggregate, but to a self. So the self does not independently exist as one with the five aggregates, nor as separate from them.

That's it. It is neither one nor many. That is the other side. If the self is separate from the aggregates, then where is it? It can't exist apart from the aggregates. Further, it can't be in between either. It has to be either one with or separate from the aggregates. So the big bossy ego does not exist at all. If it exists, where is it? It has to be one with or separate from the aggregates. If one with them, there has to be as many selves as there are aggregates and elements. But we don't have split personalities. Then it must be all together mumble jumbled up. But then, at death, when the body is burnt, do you cremate the self too? Do you bury the ego? No, we don't. We travel on to future lives.

So now you have to draw the conclusion. Such a self cannot exist in oneness with the aggregates, nor separately from them. Therefore, because there can't be a third possibility, such a self does not exist at all.

I want to quote Kyabje Rimpoche one more time, when he talks about brten brel, pronounced ten drel, the interdependent nature of existence.

The great Guru Chone Lama Rinpoche has said: the word "brtcn" is to demonstrate the void nature of the ego; it explains the lack of true existence of the self.

Ten means you depend on something. You cannot exist by yourself.

The second word, "brel", explains the interdependent nature, the functions in keeping with the experience of ordinary people.

The King of Logic says, "Because ego is dependent arising, it cannot truly exist." You depend on other factors to exist, so you don't exist truly, from your side. Nor is there a total lack of existence, because again, you exist dependently. So this reasoning works in both ways. It refutes eternalism, because you exist dependently. It refutes nihilism because you arise dependently.

Take the subject of ego. Does ego truly exist? No, because it is dependently arising. Is it completely non-existent? No, because it does dependently arise. This is exactly how it should be working and therefore it is the King of Logic.

At this level of the discussion in the Bodhisattvacharyavatara, the debate between the Mind Only and Prasangika-Madhyamaka schools is all about looking for the object of refutation. The teaching of Kyabje Rimpoche gives you the completely condensed bottom line meaning of emptiness, something that you can grasp. Then you work all this out in detail, arguing and comparing, figuring out which logic follows what. If you keep on tracing all that you will finally reach an unshakable understanding of the non-true existence of the ego.

No matter whatever you do has to be logically concluded. Sitting, praying and meditating will help but will never give you the wisdom, never ever. You need to mentally establish it. That is why Je Tsongkhapa insists that there are two types of meditation, analytical and concentrated. Je Tsongkhapa and already Buddha, also emphasized that you need both, shamata and vipasyana. If you don't have shamata, you have no vehicle. If you don't have vipasyana, you don't have a weapon. If you want to fight the war against the ego, you need both, vehicle and weapon. When you look to emptiness, meditation alone does not do it. You have to have reasoning. You need to meditate, but in the framework established by reasoning. You cannot just sit there, thinking, "Here is a cloud flying by, there is no ego. It is like the cloud flying by, I feel it. It is wonderful. It is there and then it is gone." That won't do any good. It will get you nowhere. It is total waste of time.

Likewise, even if you have all the intellectual and spiritual reasonings, you also need concentration. Then, even if you have all these, you still cannot reach to the deepest conclusion, because you also need merit. This is not in Kyabje Rimpoche's text at this point, but somewhere in the beginning of the teaching he says that this cannot be realized by intellectual means alone, this cannot be reached by mere meditation, it cannot be reached by meditation and intellectual contemplation, but it needs merit and the unbroken lineage of guru, the lineage blessings and the prerequisite understanding. With all of that you can definitely achieve this.

If the conditions are right, if there is qualified guru, qualified disciple, qualified reasoning, qualified concentration, qualified merit, etc, then buddhahood can be produced just like an artist produces a work of art. It is not that difficult. This is what we are and that is what we are trying to do here in all our Tuesday and Thursday teachings.

20051018GRAABODHI9

Welcome to our continuing discussion of the Bodhisattvacharyatara, the Bodhisattva's Way of Life. Sometimes, when the subject is going into tremendous detail we may lose the main focus of what we are doing. So I would like to bring it back to the meaning of the title: The Bodhisattva's Way of Life.

What is a Bodhisattva? Some new people may not even know what the word itself means. A Bodhisattva is an individual practitioner who is totally inspired by the qualities and powers and capabilities of the totally enlightened mind. Not only inspired, but inspired to act, with the altruistic wish to helping all living beings. It is not just an inspiration, a desire to help all beings to become fully enlightened, but with the very very strong love, great love and great compassion. The difference between compassion and great compassion is not only how strong and concentrated the compassion is, but what the compassion is focusing on. Normally, our love and compassion is focused on one or a few individuals, at most a hundred or a thousand. But when you are talking about great compassion, the point on which one develops the compassion is ALL LIVING BEINGS. So it is not only all human beings but all living beings. It is almost unimaginable for our usual thinking. When we say that compassion is great, naturally Buddha also claims that the compassion for the suffering of people brings joy. This is not only pleasure and happiness, but joy also for oneself. That is not even for great compassion, but even for ordinary compassion.

The way one best brings joy to oneself is therefore by developing compassion for others. That is the key, but no matter how many times we hear this directly or indirectly, we don't get it. This is because we have a very strong preconceived idea that somehow in order to bring joy to myself I have to try to get joy, pray for joy, accumulate merit in order to get joy. That is a very strong preconceived idea that we all have. Even if we manage to remove that from our mind and tell ourselves that the best way to bring joy to ourselves is to have compassion for the suffering of others, it doesn't last. We forget. We still lack compassion and joy and still think, "Where is the joy? I have to grab it." I am sure each one of us has heard this hundreds of times, but still it doesn't stick in our heart. The preconceived idea to go after the joy for oneself is too strong. We think, "It is my birth right, I must have it." With that idea we do everything and we always go wrong.

We never think with normal common sense that one's joy depends on one's compassion, looking at the sufferings of other people, although as a matter of fact, this is the most fundamental idea even of every democracy. We have been brought up with that idea, born and bred into democracy. I myself was born into an autocratic, aristocratic or authoritarian system. It was both, aristocratic and authoritarian. I was born into a wonderfully spiritual world, but politically it was authoritarian. It seemed to the common people as if the aristocrats had all the power, but actually the aristocrats were literally struggling to keep their status continuously.

The whole system depended on land. Although Tibet has huge masses of land, there is almost no irrigated land. The fruit of the farmers comes only once a year and that is the major basis of the economy. Because of lack of irrigation the usable land is extremely limited. And that limited land was owned by three main groups: the aristocracy, the government and the monasteries, which included lamas, labrangs and monastic institutions. The weakest of these groups was the aristocratic families. The strongest group was the monasteries. No one could take land away from the monasteries for fear of the monks rebelling. There were 10,000 monks in one monastery alone and the whole Tibetan army did not have 10,000 soldiers. So the monks could just walk over everything. That was very obvious. So the aristocratic families were struggling for their status among themselves, one eating the other one. Their suffering was almost like that of the animals. The way it happened was that the government would often punish some families for doing something wrong. They would confiscate all their land on behalf of the government and later give it to another aristocratic family for their good deeds.

Therefore Tibet was ruled in an authoritarian, aristocratic system. The western countries of today are democracies. The main principles of democracy are equality and individual rights and respect. These are the very principles that the lives of the Bodhisattvas and the bodhimind itself are based on. Bodhimind is based on great compassion and that is based on great love. Great love is based on remembering the kindness. That is based on recognizing the kindness of all beings, all of whom at one time or another have been our closest, nearest and dearest person. That itself is based on the understanding of equality and equanimity. This is how equality is built into the practice of bodhimind as well as into the foundation of every democracy.

And yet we often forget this completely and instead think that we have to grab for everything for ourselves. Look at our system, which is based on equality and consideration for others. But every corporation and business is characterized by competition and greed. The grabbing comes from that level. It is because of our habitual pattern or addiction for self-cherishing. Our great forefathers have designed the system of democracy, which was based on equality. It could almost be like Shantideva's bodhisattvacharyavatara. In principle it is very similar to it. However, our addiction to self-cherishing determines how we really function in the world, in the corporate business world and even in our daily life.

I have seen both, corporate life, administrative life, as well as the usual wonderful happy life most people here in this room have. We do have a happy life. We don't get much into the competitive struggle, where everything is difficult, secret and competitive. Most of us don't go for that. A few of us may have to do it to a limited extent in order to survive in the job. But mostly we don't have to submit to the pressure and struggle of competition, trying to grab for something. This is all a build up following from self-cherishing. We have almost reached the peak level of self cherishing today. There is nowhere else to go now except to fall down and dismantle it. That's what is going to happen. That is how all the countercultural movements come up. The hippies have come because of that. If society gets too extreme, some people go into the opposite direction. This is samsara.

True democracy and the Bodhisattva's way have a lot in common. And I also do remember that in the days of early exile of the Tibetans in India, some young Tibetans set up a communist party. The majority of the Tibetans are very much anti-communists because it was the communists who kicked us out of our country, but there was a Tibetan youth group who really like to have a communist party. They went to see both, Kyabje Ling Rimpoche and Kyabje Trijang Rimpoche and presented them with their communist manifesto. Just after they came out I went in. And Kyabje Trijang Rimpoche was still looking at that manifesto and reading through. He told me,

"A group of young, very handsome, wonderful and intelligent young people just came and told me they wanted to be communists. I thought, "What a waste!" but then they gave me something which looks like their constitution [the manifesto] and when I read this is looks just like the bodhisattvacharyatara."

The basic principles of the socialist ideas are therefore also based on compassion. In the beginning and according to their principles, communism is not as bad as it later turned out to be. The ideas of Marx and Engels were not so bad. I learnt about them a little bit from listening to the Chinese. As a matter of fact, they had great ideas. When it went to Lenin, those ideas began to become corrupted through the grab for power and then Stalin contributed tremendously to that and on top of that Chairman Mao was added, not to mention Kruchchow and Fidel Castro. These leaders brought an originally great idea to such an extreme state that we came to look at communism as a terrible threat, even to the point of inspiring McCarthy's activities.

This is an example of how a great idea can completely be turned around and changed into something terrible. Some time ago, during a lecture, I was using the Tibetan word cho trib. That is someone who knows about Dharma, but only the words but doesn't make any sense out of it, doesn't get any value from it. The traditional Tibetan teachers give this example:

Every kind of leather can be treated with butter to make it smooth, except the leather container in which the butter is kept, cannot to be treated with butter.

Likewise, the cho tribs are very used to the dharma environment, have thorough knowledge at the educational, informational level. However, their mind, their personality is not affected by it and then that knowledge becomes crazy, wild and twisted, making a good thing into something that is becoming worse.

Therefore, it is so important to integrate compassion and caring into your mind all the time. I want to underline all the time. Otherwise, if you keep on forgetting, all the talk about dharma will become meaningless and senseless. Maybe it will sound beautiful, maybe not, maybe sweet or sour, but it will just be words alone. It is not connected with the individual's mind. The way to connect love and compassion to the bottom of your own heart is by feeling and practicing love and compassion for yourself and then for others. That is the link, the hook. We say that attachment is the glue of samsara. Here we say that love and compassion is the connection to spirituality within ourselves. The moment we lose is, we lose the connection. It does not matter what nationality or race you are, what your skin color or hair color may be, whether you are bald headed or long-haired. You may wear monk's robes, red plus yellow robes, but if you don't have that connection, your spirituality is in appearance only, just show biz. On the other hand, if you do have that connection, then no matter who you are, man, woman, cat or dog, you have a solid spiritual base.

Compassion and love depend on caring. That is why Buddha says that compassion brings joy. If you care, you will be able to help and that brings joy. It is a joy that cannot be destroyed by hatred. It cannot be destroyed by obsession. Such a joy will become great joy and finally the joy that has never known suffering. That is the goal.

The way the Bodhisattvas function in life is described in the chapters of the bodhisattvacharyavatara. We have already read eight chapters. First we hear about the benefit of bodhimind, how wonderful it is. Then it goes to generosity, morality, conscientiousness, alertness, awarenss, patience, enthusiasm, concentration and wisdom.

We are now at the level of wisdom. Wisdom is not just knowing something, but more than that, knowing the absolute reality. This is extremely difficult to comprehend. We discuss the various views of the earlier Indian and Tibetan masters on that wisdom. It is not that some of them did not fully comprehend the subject. They did. However, in order to show us the different levels of subtlety, they have presented particular ways of thinking about emptiness. In that context they present different ideas of what existence is all about. This is how a number of different Buddhist tenets have come about. From that perspective, not every Buddhist accepts emptiness as the reality. There are a number of Buddhist tenets that don't accept emptiness at all. For them emptiness becomes total empty.

Those masters, in truth, do know their emptiness, but for the sake of presenting the different levels, they maintain a consistent presentation of a particular view on emptiness. They have set up philosophical schools and taught that way. Later students, like us, are fortunate to be able to look back at all of them. From the beginning we have already been informed that these views are not true. We are visiting them with the preconceived idea that they are not true. We are already looking at them with the intention of finding out what is their fault, rather than what are they saying. We have also been told which view is the right one.

Apart from that, the presentation of the different tenets leaves it entirely up to us to analyze and find out for ourselves why some of their views are not correct.

We are informed by the different tenets that Buddha does accept their thoughts. Every school will trace back their presentation to the words of Buddha. In that way, although they are not correct, they are authentically Buddhist. That is why the Buddhist masters and presenters will say, "This view is according to this system, that view is according to that system", and so on. At that time the question of "What system do you follow?" is not asked. That is not necessary, because we already have been given the preconceived idea of following only the best system. We want to settle for nothing but the best. And we have been told what system that is. We should keep that in mind and then study all the tenets. Finding out about what the lower tenets say will help us to more clearly see why the higher tenets are superior.

At our level, when we look into the lower tenets in order find what is wrong with them, we are not going to find it. We are not even clear of what they are saying. This is because here on Tuesdays we can only read a few words from their tenets, give a little explanation, read some commentaries here and there and that's it. What we are doing here on Tuesday nights and Thursday nights is very similar. The difference is that the Thursday night text we are using as the basis is so tough. It is really hard - like rock. At this moment it is like chewing rock. If you have heard me talking last Thursday night you will know how tough it is.

It is also not easy for me to teach this. Normally, when I teach on lam rim or anything else, I only prepare for a few minutes or even just pick up the subject when I arrive and talk about it. While you are saying the prayers, I may look at a few pages and that's it. But the current topic on Thursday night is based on Tsongkhapa's lam rim chen mo. If I read a section the day before the teaching, I don’t even know what it is talking about. It is absolutely Greek. I have to read the same pages 3 to 10 times. And then there is a commentary on that. That commentary is a compilation of the views of four different scholars. They all give you contradicting points. Their different comments are only marked by a letter from the alphabet like "ja" or "ba" and so on. Only by that you know that a particular passage marked by "ja" is a comment by Jamyang Shepa and one marked by "ba" means it is Baso talking. "ta" means that some Amdo lama is talking there. However, they give totally different points. So you have to compare them, pull them together, think more about it, adjust and come out. It is helpful for me in order to re-study the subject, but it also shows you how tough this subject is.

Compared with biting the hard rock of the lam rim chen mo, the study of the bodhisattvacharyavatara wisdom chapter is like eating mushy chocolate. But even here, we compare the different viewpoints of the different tenets.

At this moment we are presenting the Mind Only (skt: Chittamatra or Yogachara) School's point of view, their arguments and counter-arguments contrasted with that of the Madhyamakas. We are at verse 18 and 19. But I want to briefly review the exchange of arguments so far.

Below the Chittamatra the other Buddhist schools accept external existence as identity. The Chittamatrins don't accept that. To them, however, mind is still an intrinsically existent true reality. It is almost like permanent. They say that if the mind is not a true identification of the person then the person does not exist at all. They say that would be the extreme of nihilism. But they are wise enough to see that external reality is not intrinsically existent.

Now the Madhyamaka school insists that all phenomena don't have intrinsic existence. Everything we perceive is like a sorcerer's illusory show. The Tibetan texts use the term gyu ma, which means magician. That idea of magician is quite different from what we understand by a magician today. I was confused about that for a while. Today's magicians use actual objects, they just hide them. When they pull out a coin from your nose, it is a coin that they had cleverly hidden somewhere. They don't produce a non-existent coin out of thin air. There is an actual flower hidden in their sleeves and it only seems that they produce it from nowhere. The sorcerers are different. They attain certain powers of sorcery and can produce things from nowhere. So the Madhyamakas say that every phenomenon has no true existence, no intrinsic reality, but exists like the illusion show of a sorcerer.

The Chittamatrins reply that if phenomena have no reality at all, who is it that is able to perceive them as a sorcerer's illusion? That is verse 17:

If the mind itself is an illusion, then what is perceived by what?

The Madhyamakas then reply: If you see that external existence is not truly there, you are also going to see that the mind which perceives it is not truly existent either. What your mind perceives is not reality as it appears to you.

Alternatively, if an intrinsically existent or truly existent mind perceives external reality, then whatever that mind perceives has to be true. Mind perceives form, sound, etc. [It follows that form, sound, etc are truly existent, because everything a truly existent mind perceives has to be true]. From your own point of view therefore, external existence has to be true, because form, sound, etc are external existence. What you perceive and what you accept, in your view has to be one. It cannot be separate. Therefore, according to your own system you have to accept external existence as identity.

In that way the Madhyamaka take the argument of the Chittamatrins and use it against them. This can work because they both are using the same logical system. It is necessary to know the logical system. This is very hard. In monasteries, after 12 years, 24 hours a day, devotion and debating you begin to pick up the logical system. But one thing I learnt in the west is that the westerners pick up the logical system within the short period of 3 or 4 years study. The western education is helpful here. Certain ways of thinking and analyzing does not normally exist in the Tibetan mind, but it does in the educated mind in the west. That really helps tremendously.

The Chittamatrins now say that for them external existence still does not exist, but what does exist is some kind of substance which is part of the internal perceiving mind. In other words, they are saying that what we see is only a reflection of the internal mind, rather than something existing out there. We perceive it to be externally, but it is an internal reflection.

This is similar to when we perceive with the physical base of the eye consciousness, the eye ball. This sees forms and then some part of the physical aspect of the eye ball perceives the form upside down. The reflection is turned in the opposite direction by another internal faculty and then we see each other standing up. If we remove this internal "lens" we would see each other upside down. The Chittamatrins are saying exactly that: that we are seeing an internal reflection of some mental substance which is perceived to be external. On the basis of this argument the Chittamatrins are saying that external reality does not exist.

Now comes the Madhyamakas' next reply. They are saying to the Chittamatrins, According to your system, since it is only the reflection of internal mind that appears externally, there is no separation between who is seeing and what they see. If that is the case then mind is seeing mind. And this is not in accordance with Buddha's words, because Buddha says that mind cannot see mind. No matter how sharp a weapon is, a sword cannot cut itself. Likewise, mind cannot see itself.

In between that, someone else came up with the example that no matter how long your fingernail grows it will not touch itself. That may not work. If your nail grows very long it will twist and then it may touch itself.

The Chittamatrins counter argument is presented in verse 18:

[Yogacharin] It illuminates itself, as does a lamp.

According to them, one light not only illuminates itself but also clears the darkness.

The Madhyamakas counter by saying, still in verse 18:

[Madhyamaka] A lamp does not illuminate itself, for it is not concealed by darkness.

If light clears light there would be no time at which darkness would cover it up. Since the darkness does not cover there is no need for light to illuminate itself because there is no darkness in light.

The Chittamtrins insist: Mind sees itself and other phenomena. For example, when you see a crystal paperweight it may at times look blue, depending on certain conditions, like the reflection of something else. However, a piece of lapis lazuli will remain in the nature of blue, right from the beginning. Therefore, mind has two points: one is seeing itself and one is seeing other phenomena. Mind sees both. Seeing a crystal becoming blue-colored is the example of seeing others and seeing the blueness of lapis lazuli is the example of seeing itself.

In Tibetan this is called rang rig - self-seeing. rig is a very interesting word which can be pulled a million different ways. For example, rigpa as in Sogyal Rimpoche's Rigpa Centers is used almost in the sense of mahamudra and clear light. Apart from that, rig pa can mean mind, thought, idea, seeing. So here, rang rig means self-seeing. That is a bit different from self-observing. Observing is almost like you see your own thoughts and behavior as reflections in the mirror that you can observe. This will also come in the next verse.

Verse 19

[Yogacarin:] A blue object does not require something else for its blueness, as does a crystal. So something may or may not occur in dependence on something else.

The Cittamatrins maintain that mind can be divided into seeing self and seeing others.

The Madhyamakas say that light cannot illuminate itself just like darkness cannot shadow darkness. Light can clear up darkness but darkness cannot shadow darkness. Darkness shadows the objects so that you cannot see them, but it does not shadow darkness. When you put a cloth over a glass of water, the cloth covers the glass of water. Darkness cannot cover darkness like a cloth covers a glass.

verse 20:

[Madhyamaka:] As in the case of non-blueness, blue is not regarded as its own cause. What blue by itself could make itself blue?

The Madhayamakas next counter argue the Chittamatrins' example of the lapis lazuli being blue from the beginning.

They say that before the lapis lazuli comes into existence as lapis lazuli it is not blue. It only becomes blue at the moment of coming into existence as lapis lazuli. The components of lapis lazuli are not blue. Therefore the blueness of lapis lazuli also depends on other conditions. In that sense the example of the blueness of lapis lazuli cannot be used as an example of self-existence or self seeing or self perceiving.

verse 21:

[Yogacharin:] It is said that a lamp illuminates once this is cognized with awareness. The mind is said to illuminate once this is cognized with what?"

The Chittamatrins now say: Light does not see itself, but by nature it is clear. Likewise, mind is in the nature of mind and in the nature of understanding. Therefore, mind does not clear itself. Rather it is in the nature of clarity.

The Madhyamaka reply to that is: If that is the case then mind knowing the mind clearly depends on another substance, which has to depend also on another substance and there will be countless, endless substances in order to establish this. Therefore your presentation does not make any sense. The example is given in the next verse:

verse 22:

[Madhyamaka:] If no one perceives whether the mind is luminous or not, then there is no point in discussing it, like the beauty of a barren woman's daughter.

When you realize that there is no son of a barren woman, the question of how handsome, short, tall or fat that son of a barren woman is, does not rise, because the son of a barren woman does not exist.

I am going to stop at this point. I will be back on Nov 1st and revisit the topic and make sense of the Chittamatra-Madhyamaka argument. I am not going to open this up to question. The subject is a little hard and so the questions might just make it more confusing.

[[There are a couple of announcements I would like to make: our next speaker for the Sunday morning series in Ann Arbor is Jonathan Rose and the topic is on Buddhism and the Environment. That should be very interesting. Jonathan has had a long standing interest in the environmental issues and very recently attended a high powered environmental conference in Colorado. Apparently it is very important how the environment issues are coming up. Al Gore was there explaining that and John Kerry was there, spending all his time explaining why he didn't raise environmental issues during his recent presidential campaign. Then a very powerful Christian televangelist faction were saying they would be very happy to support environmental issues, provided the subject of evolution was not touched. So this Sunday talk should be very interesting and you should be able to ask questions, as long as you don't support the evolution and leave it as God's work, otherwise the environmental issues won't go anywhere. [laughs]

Then we will also have Glenn Mullin come and teach in Ann Arbor. He is a very interesting and wonderful speaker. He has written a number of books on the Dalai Lamas, on the Feminine Principle, and on Female Buddhas. He must have written almost 20 books by now, including the "Six Yogas of Naropa". He has done a lot of translations in Tibetan Buddhism over the last 40 years. He was also very instrumental for Drepung Losseling. The Sacred Dance and Sacred Music performances of their monks were the original idea of Glenn Mullin. He arranged that for Losseling and now every other monastery has picked up on that and is sending monks everywhere to do that.

We will also have Khen Rimpoche Geshe Lobsang Tsetan come and teach in Ann Arbor. He is a solid guy, a geshe and has now become abbot of Tashi Lungpo. That is why he is now called Khen Rimpoche.

Finally, Sandy will give a work shop here in November.

I myself will be here for another 2 talks in November, then go to Europe and Asia and will be back with you in January. Thank you for all your patience and good night. ]]

20051101GRAABODHI9

Welcome tonight. I have to talk to you about my intention to change the way we do the wisdom teachings on the bodhisattvacharyavatara. We have been talking the bodhisattvachayavatara on Tuesday for years. I thought at first I can do the whole teaching in one year. Then it turned into two, three years and more and at some point, when I thought, we were doing it for a year or so, I was told we had already been doing it for 4 years. Then it took a few more years. The teachings went very well until we reached the 9th chapter, the wisdom chapter. This is getting harder and harder and now my realization is that it is not okay to do this on Tuesday nights and try to deal with one verse at a time. Instead of being a service to people it may become a disservice.

The same situation has developed with the Thursday teachings in New York. I began teaching the Odyssey to Freedom some 4 years ago and went through all the points, including the six paramitas up to the paramita of concentration. We do have a little transcript called GOM that shows how well the teachings went on that point. But the 6th paramita of wisdom is not going so well with the Thursday night format. I am basing it on the lam rim chen mo text and it is also getting harder and harder.

Here in Ann Arbor, you people keep on showing up Tuesday after Tuesday, and I am not sure how much you are getting from this subject. It has almost come to the point where you show up here to give me moral support [laughs], for which I am thankful but I think we need a little bit more than that. For this year, apart from today, we only have one more Tuesday left. Then next year, I am not going to continue this wisdom chapter of the bodhisattvacharyavatara on Tuesdays. On Tuesdays we will come out with nice open teachings. From the program point of view we do have an idea of how the Tuesday teachings hang together, but it will appear like it is a different topic every Tuesday. But I am not going to leave the wisdom teaching behind. Therefore, next year we will continue the wisdom teachings by meeting once a month for a Friday night and an all-Saturday teaching. The Saturdays will probably go from 12 noon or 1 pm to 5.30 pm or 6 pm. That way we will be able to set aside a chunk of time once a month. I am going to do the same thing in New York as well. This way we can do the wisdom subject well and it will become solid and steady.

To do this on Tuesday and Thursday nights is becoming very hard. We could only pick up the subject realistically for half an hour to an hour at the most and some Tuesdays we don't meet at all, so we don't even engage the subject at all for weeks.

With the new week end format I am thinking of beginning on Friday night with a session to bring our attention and focus to the subject and then on Saturday do the major work.

We will continue with this format until we complete the 9th chapter, the wisdom chapter. For the 10th chapter I can bring the bodhisattvacharyavatara teaching back to Tuesdays. It is very easy, almost like praying. It is almost -as Kyabje Trijang Rimpoche once told me - like the Tibetan Communist Party Manifesto.

Once a group of young Tibetans came to see Kyabje Trijang Rimpoche and Ling Rimpoche and gave them their Communist Party Manifesto to read. Kyabje Trijang Rimpoche called it their "constitution". He read through it and said, "This doesn't look like anything coming from the Chinese communists that we know from Tibet. It looks more like something out of the bodhisattvacharyavatara.”

So this dedication aspect we can do on Tuesdays again. It is really like a prayer and we can do five or more verses per night. They don't need much explanation. Those who are really interested in the wisdom chapter and are prepared to put in a lot of hard work may come, and the rest don't have to come if you don't want to. It is not something compulsory. In order not to miss the bodhisattvacharayavatara teaching I could just read the verses in Tibetan for the sake of keeping the oral transmission complete. This is how I am trying to do the right thing for you and me and everybody.

Today and next Tuesday I am going to conclude whatever we have done throughout this year. By the middle of November I am going to Europe and when I get back we will start with the January courses.

There is actually not so much to conclude from what we did this year because we really didn’t do anything. We talked but didn't really do much. Did we really make a dent? Not really. We did something, so that you people get at least some idea what wisdom and what emptiness is. At least we know that when talking about wisdom, it is not just knowledge. Buddhist wisdom is a very specific wisdom. That wisdom is the wisdom that knows the reality. This is the reality of everything, not something abstract. We are not talking about what is the reality of America or Iraq. We are talking about the reality of me, the individual, connected with the reality of the people of America and the situation of the whole country, as well as the situation of the larger world. If you separate our individual reality from the reality of the world the problem is that we separate ourselves from the world. We disconnect. That is not right. We have to be connected with the absolute reality, what is really happening. What am I really? What is this country really? When we investigate that, we get a different picture.

Look at this country, the United States of America. Yes, we are Americans, but we are not America. We belong to a group a people, known as Americans. What is America? The people, the land, the culture, the history? It is not a single entity. The people are not America, the land alone is not America. The culture doesn't make this America. The language alone is not America. The combination of all of these together makes it America.

For me at least there is no solid thing called America. The reality of America really boils down to the combination of all parts and parcels fitting together. That becomes America. You can't find a solid unitary thing called "America". Take the president. He is not America, he is an American president. Likewise, the government is not America but only the government. Even the government itself consists of three parts, the executive, the legislative and the judiciary. Combined together they are the government. This tells us that the absolute reality of America is emptiness. That doesn't mean that it is empty, but there is no one thing that you can identify as "This is it". That is the real wisdom which Buddha presented to us 2600 years ago. At that time some of the people listening to him must have thought he had gone crazy.

I used America as example or metaphor, but you also have to look at the individual person. It is the same situation. No matter whoever the individual person maybe, they aer not just their body. When somebody thinks, "The body is me", that is a wrong perception, a wrong view. When we look carefully we know that our body is not "me". But we don't know yet that our mind is not "me" either. My mind is not me. It is part and parcel of me. The combination of my body and my mind together becomes me. If my mind is not in my body, then where is "me"? I remember the comedy with Steve Martin called "All of me." His mind went into a little copper pot with water and that crazy little Indian guy was chanting and then suddenly a horse came and kicked the pot over and the water went inside the flowers. I am not saying that this movie is a hundred per cent correct, but the mind does travel and transfer and transform and improve. Mind is impermanent, it changes. Our mind changes all the time, especially mine. I have been accused today of changing my mind all the time. Without a mind I am not there. I depend on mind and body to exist. Right body, right mind and right label for the right object becomes "Gehlek." Gehlek exists on the basis of all these parts and parcels. That is why in absolute reality you are not going to find anything.

Likewise, when you look for the government of the United States you are not going to find anything to point out "this is it". This is true for everything. Ultimately you cannot find anything if you analyze it. I just heard on the Tibetan Radio station that there was a spiritual-scientific conference in Dharamsala with the well-known Indian physicist Dr. Rajindra Prasatichatra and with Samdong Rimpoche and others. That physicist was saying that the scientists had become very materialistic, looking for the absolute zero point, an absolutely existing particle, like the atom. After thinking they had found the ultimate smallest particle, they discovered it too could be divided into smaller particles. This is known to all of us by now anyway. There is no such thing that cannot be divided. Using Stephen Hawkins' language: there is no end of the Russian doll. Not finding the end of the Russian doll, that is the Buddha's view which he presented 2600 ago.

Not every Buddhist will actually buy that. There are a lot of different schools of thought in Buddhism. Some think that you can find the "me". If you cannot find it internally, they say that as a reflection you can see it in the external existence. Buddha used the term "emptiness", so all schools say that they recognize emptiness. But emptiness has to be empty of something. You may be able to say that your wallet is empty or that your wallet is lost and gone. Somebody else has it. You may say that a glass is empty of water. The water is gone. So all the different schools present that we are empty of something other than what we really are. Some say we are empty of external existence, or we exist as the reflection of the internal mind in external objects. Others say we are free of that type of existence and then the non-existence of that type of existence becomes wisdom. Some say that freedom from external existence is wisdom, but that the mind is permanent and exists in true reality. So the different schools have different views of how to understand emptiness.

The final, most subtle viewpoint of all the schools is the madhyamaka or Middle Way school of Nagarjuna. Even that is divided into two: the followers of Buddhapalita and the followers of Bhavaviveka.

I don't know how true it is but today's buddhologists say that the division of the madhyamaka into two is only done by the Tibetans. But the Tibetans don't talk about a division of two madhyamaka schools within Tibet. They are talking the madyamaka in India, before Buddhism came to Tibet. That was when the great Indian panditas Buddhapalita and Lek den je (Bhavaviveka) taught. Lek den je almost goes to the point of saying that within the faultless mind there is still some kind of substance from its own side which truly exists. Lek den je includes that qualifying aspect in the point that you are supposed to negate. So even at that level there is division. However, it has been repeated by all Tibetan teachers in every tradition and especially Tsongkhapa emphasizes it that we should follow Nagarjuna's explanation through the interpretation of Buddhapalita and Chandrakirti. It is like a constitution with its interpretation. According to Buddhapalita's and Chandrakirti's interpretation emptiness has no base at all, neither internal nor external. Nothing truly exists, neither thoughts, nor energy, no vibration, no particle - nothing. Existence is only the combination of parts. That alone is capable of functioning, of taking responsibility, of working. Just that exists, nothing beyond that. That is the real point of existence: it is just the combination alone. The moment the combination is no longer there, you don't exist any more. It goes almost to that point. Once you see that point you realize that still it doesn't negate the ability to function, it doesn't negate karma and responsibility.

It is difficult to see what has to be negated and then it is difficult to establish what exists. Once you have emptied it you have to fill it with something. The point of negation and the point of establishment are the two difficult points. If the negation goes too far, it becomes nihilistic. If the negation is too little, it becomes existentialistic [eternalistic]. That is the meaning of madhyamaka, the middle path.

In the teachings so far we have been making attempts to move in that direction. It feels to me that we have not even gone near the door. We haven't rung the bell, but from the distance we have been throwing stones at the door. That is my conclusion of what we have been doing this year. We are trying to know what it is in there. We are interested, that 's why we are throwing stones at the door. Deeply in there, the reality is just such an extremely subtle point and yet it is capable of functioning, responsible for deeds. It makes our karma function even better. Emptiness does not negate karma. If it does, it becomes nihilistic. Emptiness compliments karma and the karmic functioning compliments emptiness. That is what Tsongkhapa means when he says

Emptiness appears out of interdependence and the interdependent nature appears out of emptiness. The essence of emptiness is interdependence and the essence of interdependence is emptiness.

We are throwing stones at the door that is shut to us right now. We really want to know what is in there. What we are looking for is the truth of that statement. Even if were able to open the door, we may or may not clearly see it. It is better to keep throwing lots of stones at the door at this point, so we can figure out a little more what wisdom is all about.

I don't want to follow what happens in this Indian story where four blind people try to figure out what an elephant looks like. One touches the ears, one the trunk, one the legs and one the tail. Each of them thinks they know what the elephant looks like and what it is. The one holding the ear says, "The elephant is flat and floppy", the one holding the leg says "it is like a huge column", the one holding the tail says, "It is a thin, tiny thing". So we don't want our understanding of emptiness be like that. It doesn't matter to what level of depth we can get, but we should have a solid, correct idea of emptiness. This shouldn’t just be the knowledge of what words I said but should be expressed in your understanding. Just look at the example of America and you will know. You need a solid understanding and then meditate on it. That is the wisdom we want.

Until we get there, we will have to substitute the understanding of emptiness by thinking according to the vajrayana method about emptiness in terms of space-like emptiness. Whatever dependently exists we imagine has been dismantled and disappeared completely, reaching the reality of space-like emptiness. Yet it is the basis of everything functioning. But don't make the mistake of thinking there is nothing there, like a zero, non-existence. Non-existence is not emptiness. Emptiness does not negate something that has existed, but it negates something that has never existed, but which we perceive to be existing. Without that understanding, the space-like emptiness is meaningless. In vajrayana you go through the death-dying stages dissolving system, which finally dissolves into nothing. It means that all existence is dismantled and melts into that base-foundation. Out of this everything grows and rises again. It is that level of space-like emptiness. That is wisdom. If you just think there is nothing there, that will not be wisdom. It will be a nihilistic view. That is the difference. Even on our mundane lay person's level you should have that background thinking. Don't let it become totally empty, that would not be right.

Basically, that aspect of the understanding of emptiness is a fundamental basis for our wisdom. Without wisdom you can never hope to gain enlightenment. Even freedom from samsara is not possible without wisdom. This wisdom is also the basis of the enlightened mind. Technically, this is known as dharmakaya. It is the product of wisdom. When wisdom has improved to the totality of its potential it becomes the mind of enlightenment. When love and compassion develops to its totality it becomes the physical aspect of the enlightened person. Body and mind function on one frequency. They become oneness. We talk about two separate things that become one or union.

In vajrayana you need the pride of the deity. That does not mean that your ordinary body becomes a deity. The ordinary body dissolves through the dissolving system into the nature of reality, out of which the seed syllables bring up the pure aspects of that body, which is the yidam, whichever yidam it may be. The pride is therefore an important aspect of vajrayana, but it is not focused on this big, fat ordinary body of ours. That is not Yamantaka or Vajrayogini. The essence of this ordinary body completely dissolves through the dissolving system. The seed of that transforms, becomes pure and out of the purity, that very "me" is the pride where the yidam is put. That body on which you put the pride is the ultimate result. It is the ultimate result in the sense that the subject material which made that body is love-compassion and the substance which made the enlightened mind is wisdom. The union of these is what enlightenment is all about. That is our spiritual goal. When I talk about transformation, don't think that this ordinary body is being painted golden in a paint shop. Nor is it something that is dipped into gold- plating solution and come out looking yellow. The work of the wisdom is that and the work of love-compassion if finally going to be that. Remember, in the Ganden Lha Gye ma teaching it says that when the guru is right, the disciple is right, you can produce enlightenment like an artist produces a little piece of art by hand. When you make something by hand you need a substance out which to make it. You need at least mud, or bronze or metal. Here the material is love-compassion and wisdom. Wisdom makes the mind, love-compassion makes the body and the union of that is the union of body and mind, which is enlightenment. This becomes the union of absolute truth and relative truth.

This is what I wanted to say tonight. I can talk to you a little more next Tuesday and this Thursday, Friday and Saturday I will be in New York, talking about the wisdom. I am going to do this also the following week end, on Nov 11-13. We will start the wisdom week ends in Ann Arbor next year in January.

Thank you and good night.

20091108GRAABODHI9

Welcome to this last Tuesday that I am going to talk tonight for this year. There will be other programs, such as the 12 links talks by senior students. I will be back for teachings on Tuesdays by January next year.

I will reschedule the wisdom teachings next year, because doing 1 hour a week is not doing much good. Last week end in New York I did a wisdom teaching over the week end, especially on Saturday from 1 to 5 pm. That works much better and we are going to do the same in Ann Arbor. We have confirmed to be doing this for one Saturday every month, from 1 pm to 5.30 or 6 pm.

Marked dates for wisdom teachings: January 28, March 25, April 8, June 3, July 29, September 30, October 21.

Looking at this, there are not so many dates. We will have to find some additional time to cover the wisdom chapter. We used to be able to do Saturday and Sunday, but now, with the regular Sun morning programs, we can't shift them so easily either.

My regular Tuesday teachings will continue next year and topics will be announced soon.

Since tonight is the last Tuesday talk this year, I will continue to sum up the teachings from this year. Last time I did sum up the wisdom aspects of the teaching. Tonight I will sum up the compassion aspects.

Basically, love, compassion and wisdom are part of the mahayana and hinayana Buddhist traditions. The hinayana prefers to be called theravada. In the technical terminology of the Hindu Buddhist traditions, yana means 'vehicle'. When I want to get from one point to another I need a vehicle. Here we have cars. Without car I would have to use the two vehicles given to me by my mother, which would take a very long time. A good vehicle transports me from my house to the center. In the Buddhist tradition we refer to ourselves as ordinary. We are not extraordinary. We are the normal, usual human beings, people who may or may not be interested in the spiritual path. If you are interested, then through a spiritual practice you can change and become an extraordinary person. How do you know when or if you become extraordinary? You have to look from the angle of your own perception of compassion, your own responsibility to yourself and others. From that angle you will see how much you have changed. There are some changes due to age and maturity. But the spiritual change is quite different from the natural change through age and maturity. Compassion, caring and so on will make a big difference. When you don't have that, then you get comments like "I have been burnt out". This is because there is no strong caring. With strong caring you don't get burnt out. The example is the mother's love. Her love towards the children doesn't know burn-out - as long as the child is cute [chuckles].

Care comes way before compassion. When we ordinary people want to become extraordinary people we need a vehicle. Buddhism provides a number of different vehicles. One is the hinayana, then there is mahayana and vajrayana. All of them are teachings of the Buddha. Within the Buddhist realm this is not just regular teaching. Normally, when you listen to teachings it is about listening to what someone is talking. But within the framework of Buddhism, teaching means to share the experience. All teachings in Buddhism are experiential. We however, are copy cats. We are copying Buddha and the earlier masters. Buddha taught his personal experience at various levels. According to the tradition that I come from, Buddha taught the hinayana path to a group of people who - according to the mahayana - are not intelligent enough or brave and fortunate enough.

What is the principle in the hinayana? All vehicles actually have these principles: what you want to get, what you have to get rid of and what you have to develop. What you have to get rid of is negative karma. Negative karma creates suffering. We don't want suffering. We may not be able to get rid of suffering in terms of the symptoms, but we can get rid of suffering in terms of causes. We can cancel out the cause.

Getting rid of suffering means getting rid of the causes. Without causes you won't have results. Buddha talked about the Four Noble Truths: The truth of suffering, and the cause of suffering. What are the causes of suffering? They are karma and delusion. The karmic cause is not there unless we act. We act because we are forced by negative emotions. The delusions come through the negative emotions. Negative emotions mean hatred, jealousy, etc. You have to get rid of all of those in order to make yourself happy. That is the major focus how to help yourself. And that is why it is called self liberation. The major focus is how to help yourself. The focus is on reducing suffering by reducing the negative emotions and by eliminating negative emotions. When there is obsession you don't act according to the obsession. When there is hatred you don't act according to the hatred. That is how you reduce the causal level. The major emphasis here is on helping oneself. That is traditionally called the smaller vehicle or hinayana.

The second vehicle is called mahayana. This is the SUV, not a tiny, little thing. The Mahayana vehicle is based on the smaller vehicle. It is a misunderstanding to separate the two. It is not right to say, "I am a follower of the smaller vehicle, I have nothing to do with the bigger vehicle", nor is it okay to think, "I am with the big vehicle, I have nothing to do with the small vehicle." The way how you help yourself, carrying that particular path and then trying to help others, that is the mahayana path. Helping others is also not limited to some people, like our loved ones, our family, our near and dear ones, but to all living beings. That means ALL of them.

Among the three principles, the first is to develop compassion for oneself. That is not yet talking about compassion to others. Usually no one talks about developing compassion for oneself. Traditionally, the word 'renunciation' is used, or "determination to be free". The reality however, is that you first need compassion for yourself, caring for yourself. So you don't abuse yourself by overly indulging in negative emotions and entertaining them, including obsession, attachment, hatred, jealousy and so on. If you care for yourself, you don't abuse yourself.

There are many ways to abuse yourself: through alcohol, drugs, food, sugar, chocolate and so on. If you do all that, you don’t care for yourself. You will become obese, sick, alcoholic or whatever. The opposite of eating too much is just as bad: some people eat very little and then they even throw up everything. Even smoking cigarettes is abusive. We now know that. It is written on the cigarette packets: smoking causes cancer. There is a lot of public awareness and advertising about that.

But what we don’t know and about which there is no advertising campaign is how harmful hatred is, how harmful obsession is. Actually, hatred hurts us a lot. Hatred brings violence, violence brings violence. We now have non-stop war, and that comes from hatred and obsession, both. Obsession comes in by thinking, "I want your territory. I must have it, because you have got oil! We need that oil 30-40 years from now, but we must have it now!" In what way obsession and hatred bring suffering.

I do remember very well that 20 years ago, all over the world, America meant something wonderful. It was a land of education, freedom and choice, the land of civil liberties, self-determination, civil rights and equality. People throughout the world admired Americans.

And today, when you travel anywhere in the world, you don’t want to show your passport. You try to hide it as much as you can. America is now perceived as a threat to your rights. This change also has come about through hatred and obsession. But mind you, this is all completely temporary. The wind will blow it away. I am quite sure. It is temporary trouble. It will change, firstly because it is impermanent. Secondly, the people deep down are kind and compassionate. It will take time to show that up. But the moment that comes out and shines all this will change.

If you care for yourself, hatred and obsession don't help. You have to get rid of them and all other negative emotions, so that you become positive. The positive will generate the positive. Happiness brings happiness. Joy brings joy. That's why wealthy people are always wealthy. Money brings more money. Honestly. When you don't have any, you can't get more, because there is nothing to start with. That may be wrong, but that's how it is. The more money you have, the more you can invest. The more you invest the more profit you will have, which then you can invest again to get even more profit. That's how it works, right? In the same way, positive nature brings positivity. Negative nature brings negativity. Suffering brings more suffering. If something goes wrong with somebody everything goes wrong. It won't be just one thing, but two, three, four things will follow.

Helping yourself is the most important. Caring for yourself, not abusing yourself, loving and nurturing yourself, that is the theravada principle. If you don’t help yourself, who else can help you? No one. Not George Bush, nor Rumsfeld. Even your parents and your loved ones can't help you much. Only you yourself can help yourself. That is the major emphasis. The way to help yourself is by cutting down negativity. Through that you are automatically building up positivity. That helps us. Positive karma brings joy and happiness. Negative karma brings suffering and misery. That is the temporary help.

The permanent help is to eradicate completely, once and for all, the negative emotions and their root cause. The root cause is the ego. You have to cut the ego from the root and liberate yourself. The ego is what keeps you in samsara continuously. Samsara is the circle of life, birth, death, birth, date, one after another. There is only one way to cut that circle and that is by cutting ego. There is no other way. The Buddhas have emphasized it so much: there is no other door to liberation. According to both, Hinduism and Buddhism, the only door to help yourself permanently is to cut the ego, the root of samsara.

Once you become ego-free, you attain nirvana. Then the mahayana comes in saying: nirvana is great, no doubt, it is happy and beautiful. But what about your loved ones? The problem is this: when you concentrate too much on self-liberation, sometimes you cut out caring for others. Your loved ones have to cry from outside, "What about me? Are you going to walk away from me just like that?" The loved ones, the family and so on are on one side, asking. From the other side, there are also the enlightened beings. They will intervene, saying, "Are you just going to remain in the frozen picnic state? Do you want to stay half human-half vegetable in a joy-numbed state for much longer? Come on, get up, move and help. People need you." That is how they lead you towards mahayana.

A lot of people will tell you that the difference between hinayana and mahayana is compassion. That is not true - or rather it is half true. Mahayana is completely compassion-oriented, no doubt. On the other hand, there is a lot of compassion in hinayana as well. The compassion for oneself is tremendous. On top of that they do care about people. They do try to help. But it is not their major responsibility. They sympathize and give support. That is what we normally do - even though we call ourselves "mahayana'. We don't really take the responsibility. The compassion of the mahayana is known as Great Compassion. The greatness of that compassion is that it extends equally to all living beings.

Because of death and rebirth we don't recognize each other. We look different from life to life. Sometimes a male becomes female, with different name and face. Sometimes females get reborn as males. Sometimes they may be hermaphrodites. Why don't I recognize you? We normally say, "Because I never met you before." That is not true. We have met many times over many life times. But we don't recognize each other because of the changes that are taking place through death and rebirth. Otherwise all souls are old souls. At one time we see them as enemies, another time we see them as friends. They are not necessarily really enemy and friend. In total, over many lives, everybody has been our enemy, our friend, our most dearest and nearest loved one. Everyone has been the most hated enemy. There is not a single person that you can point to and say: this one has never been my nearest and dearest. There is also not a single being that you can point to who has never been your most terrifying enemy. This is because of the countless lives we have been through. Since we all want the best, it is better to focus on the compassion for all of them. You cannot bring compassion to a person unless they mean something to you. The person has to have done something for me, they have to be important to me. Until then I cannot really care for them that much. When you have some connection, some special link, then you don't mind doing something for them. You care for them. That is how our mind works.

When you are looking at all sentient beings, they have all been at one time or another our nearest and dearest. They have even given us birth a number of times as our mother. They have given us life as fathers. They have helped us as lovers. This means everyone. You cannot leave a single being out. This life is this life. It has its rules and boundaries. You have to keep them. Don’t over-run them. But in the bigger picture there is not a single being who has not been part of this. Therefore we cannot make a big distinction between beings. Even in this very life time enemies quickly become friends and friends quickly become enemies. Actually, unless you have been friends, you will not become enemies. You will disagree on certain things, being frustrated and if you don’t know how to cut it, the best friend will become the worst enemy.

In corporate companies, one partner will cheat the other and that is how they become the biggest enemies. Most law suits are because of that. You know who gets all the profit? The lawyers in between. If I fight with you, both of us will have to hire lawyers and pay them. They will enjoy that and in between make deals among each others. So even in this life, enemies and friends are nothing solid. They change. So what need is there to talk about lives and lives? That definitely changes.

It is impossible to look at any single person and say: I definitely don't owe you anything. Honestly you cannot look into the face of any person and say: I owe you nothing, you mean nothing to me. There is always some connection. If you care, then you see their suffering. The caring mind will make it difficult to bear their suffering. The animal lovers go out of their way to protect and help the animals. Then some of them go a step beyond that and accuse people for wearing animals skin, like leather or mink coats. It is because they care for the animals. Look at the very strong right wing conservatives. They are deadly against abortion because they care about life. Again, some don't know where to draw the line and to the extreme of killing the doctors and nurses. On the other hand, because of being human we have the influence of obsession and hatred. They compliment each other. Every person has a noble cause. Pro choice has a noble cause too: respecting the right of the individual. Pro life has a noble cause: respecting life. Animal protecting societies have a noble cause: protecting and saving the lives of animals. You love and you are dedicated. But because of obsession it can go beyond. Obsession will then bring hatred and that can lead to murdering the doctors who perform abortions or the people that wear the mink coats. That problem at the human level is at the level of the mind.

Our mind is brilliant. There is no limit to what it can achieve. The sky is the limit. When it goes the right way it will reach to ultimate love, ultimate compassion and total enlightenment at the Buddha level. When it goes wrong, it leads to people like Hitler, Chairman Mao, Stalin and so on. Nobody has control over human mind, except you yourself. You may get some control in your mind. Buddhism gives you tools of how to handle your mind.

The first is bringing your mind to rest. Normally, the mind is working non-stop, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, multimillion years an eon. It is constantly active, non-stop, day and night. Even at night you don’t really rest. You dream. So the first thing Buddhism gives you is rest. You try to get a little relief in your mind through meditation. By settling the mind you settle the elements within you. Once you stabilize your mind a little bit, you can begin to switch the mind's uncontrolled energy to caring. Look within yourself. You can wish yourself well, but you can also see what you can do to help yourself. Bring happiness and joy to yourself, cut down your suffering and the causes of suffering. That is how you help yourself materially, spiritually, emotionally. Once you know to do that for yourself a little bit, then you switch to the person you love the most. Then extend that to the near by, dear by, the close family, the extended family, the fellow country men, the fellow citizens of the world, all human beings, and then extend it to all living beings, including your pets and other animals. Keep extending the caring, the compassion. Compassion means to remove suffering. Love means to bring joy and happiness. It is one mind with two different aspects. I don't care who may tell you something else, but that is the definition of compassion and love. Buddha discovered this 2600 ago himself and millions of followers of Buddha developed that since then. Today there may be different interpretations of love and compassion but it is not the love and compassion that Buddha knows.

Bring love and compassion to all living beings. Such a love will bring the best joy. The best joy is a joy we have never known - the joy of total enlightenment. It is the joy that has never known suffering. It is the joy of total enlightenment, of buddhahood. That is the goal of mahayana Buddhism.

Every Buddhist practice needs to have three parts: the base you build on, the path you take and the result you hope you get. Without base, path and result you have no grounding. You are flying. It is the love and light business - flying through the air. You might as well have a nice joint and go somewhere in your mind. There are spiritual paths that encourage you: take a journey, go astral traveling. You go away in your mind, millions of miles away, with no idea where you are going, or what you are doing. You only think you are getting somewhere. The traditional Tibetan teachers have a saying: The person that is carried away by the current still thinks the situation is under control and they are swimming. One shouldn't do that.

There is always a goal, a path and a discipline. I saw on TV a few days ago a show that talked about major religions. They were saying that Christianity is still the largest religion in the world today. It is 32 %. Muslims are 20 something %. Hindus are 13 %. Then Buddhists are 11 %. But then, among the fastest growing religions there are first Muslims and then Buddhists. I don't know why the Muslims are the fastest growing religion, but as for the Buddhists it is the love and compassion and dedication to help oneself and others. It is also something very solid, with base, path and goal. It is not just simply worshipping, praying, not knowing what you are doing. You always have an aim, a purpose, where you are going and why. That helps people much better than anything else.

That's my rap up. Happy holidays to all who are listening and a very good new year that brings you joy, happiness, spiritual development and health. These are my wishes for everybody. I am looking back at a year in which most of us didn't have too great difficulties, at least, mentally, physically and emotionally. Financially, many of us have difficulties. That is natural. We think that financial concerns are the most important and will give us joy and happiness. However, they torture us the most. That is the reality. So we should rejoice and we should spend a lot of time on our practice, study, learning, analyzing, meditating, doing retreats and being good every day. With that you are building a solid investment that you can cash in when you need it most and that is at the time of death. You may be a penniless beggar, but you are very rich in your merit and wisdom merit.

In this year, unlike any other year, we have put a lot of effort in developing our wisdom merit. That is something very solid. We are not just relying on one wing of the bird, but are also building the second wing. We don't really have it yet, but we are building it. We should appreciate that and rejoice and wish that everybody may have that. We should look forward to moving beyond what we have been doing this year. That's what I would like to wish you. I still have this week end in New York teaching on wisdom and then on Monday, there is the Female Buddha exhibition lecture for the Jewel Heart Fundraiser in New York.

I have nothing more to say and wish you all the best for your support that you have given to Jewel Heart

Some more upcoming events:

Glenn Mullin in Ann Arbor

Friday, Nov 11, 7-9 pm: The Tantric Factor: Guidelines for Easy Enlightenment

Saturday workshop, Nov 12: 10 am to 5pm: Tantric Yogas of Tibet for Healing Self and Others

Sunday morning talk, Nov 13: Human Nature

Glenn has written 27 books on Tibetan Buddhism. He is a Himalayan Tibetan expert. I have known him since the 60s, when he came to Dharamsala. He has been studying and translating since then and assembled a translation team of more than 10 people. He also started the "Sacred Dance" tours of Tibetan monks in western countries.

Khen Rimpoche Geshe Losang Tsetan

Saturday, Nov 19: 10 am to 5pm: Three Principles of the Path

Sunday, Nov 20: Sunday Talk: 10 am - 11 am: Overcoming Anger and Cultivating Compassion

Khen Rimpoche is already from Ladakh, studied in Loseling, became a geshe, then lived and taught in New Jersey for a long time at Geshe Wangyal's Tibetan Learning Center. He also used to teach at the New Hampshire College every summer. Last year His Holiness the Dalai Lama appointed him to be the abbot of Tashi Lungpo, the Panchen Lama's seat. As abbot of a big monastery, you get the title of "Khen Rimpoche".

20060128GRAABODHI9PART V

Thank you for coming here today. I thought we would talk about the wisdom chapter 9 of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara, the Bodhisattva's Way of Life. This is based on the early Indian teacher Shantideva's great work. We have been doing that on Tuesdays for about 10 years. Now we have reached chapter 9, the wisdom chapter. This is extremely difficult, very hard. You all know how hard the wisdom aspect of Buddhism really is. Perhaps, I can't say it, but almost nobody else has tried to tackle the wisdom aspect of Tibetan Buddhism in the west. Yes, there are teachings, but most teachers pick up a few verses here and there, but it doesn't go through very smoothly. The teachings don't go through verse by verse. His Holiness has done a very nice teaching on the chapter 9, but you will notice that he has picked up verses here and there and not done the whole thing in detail. "Meaningful to Behold" by Geshe Kelsang Gyatso has something on the wisdom chapter too, but not in detail either. So nobody has done the detailed teaching on the wisdom chapter of the bodhisattvacharyavatara. You can tell that on Tuesdays and Thursdays in Ann Arbor and New York this is too hard a subject for people who walk in to hear something about spirituality. So we have taken that out now and we are doing it on week ends separately, in Ann Arbor as well as in New York. In New York I have moved the vipasyana aspect of the lam rim chen mo teachings from Thursday nights to the week end.

We do have a few guests here today, looking for wisdom, I am quite sure. We are going to read this text here verse by verse and I do hope you are not going to be disappointed. We have been doing this for 10 years and a lot of things are taken for granted.

However, I want to give you a little bit of background first. Every knowledge and information that Buddha has shared with us is coming through since 2600 years and it is all wisdom. But when we are talking about wisdom here, we are talking about a very specific wisdom.

Firstly, in Buddhism, everyone is totally responsible for themselves. No one else is responsible for us. What does that mean? Whatever we do, however we function, our deeds are our deeds. No matter if anyone else has seen it not, or understood what we are doing or not, it doesn't matter. Good deeds have good results for ourselves, bad deeds have their own consequences for ourselves. This is basically the karmic principle. Our life is run by our karma. Joy and happiness is the result of our positive deeds. Sadness and misery is the result of our negative deeds.

Negative and positive is sometimes also hard to distinguish. I often give the following example. In 1959 I came out of Tibet, when it was taken over by the communists. Ever since then we have some quarrel left with the Communist Chinese government. We sometimes play the game. I used to say, "What is good for the Chinese is bad for the Tibetans and what is good for the Tibetans is bad for the Chinese." This is a clear example that every deed is not necessarily good or bad. I am talking here about the Chinese government, not the Chinese people. The Chinese people are very kind and wonderful. Today is Chinese New Year and we wish all Chinese people a very happy and prosperous New Year.

So it is not the Chinese people, but rather the Chinese government. And within that, not even most government people, just a few, like Chairman Mao and some others. Apart from that it is policies that are giving trouble, not the individuals. That makes it hard to say whether some deeds are good or bad. Of course, if you are talking about killing people in the street, of course that is bad, no doubt about it. There is no question. But for other things it is questionable. You need some kind of wisdom to figure out what makes an action good. Even if you measure it on the grounds of what harms and what helps people, it is not that easy. Like I said: what is good for the Chinese is bad for the Tibetans and the other way round. So, sometimes, even with a good motivation, the actions can turn out to hurt somebody.

Mostly, we try to draw the line at the motivation: doing something with a good motivation that helps people is a good action. This distinction comes from Buddha's wisdom. However, within that there are still questions. So we do need some more wisdom in that area. Basically, violent actions are never positive. Non-violent actions are always better. But not every non-violent action is good. There is passive-aggressive behavior, for example. The human mind is extremely sophisticated and therefore our deeds are similarly sophisticated. There are people's manipulations involved and all kinds of things. So it is hard to figure out and that is what we are trying to learn.

All the positive karma and all the negative deeds are categorized in the Buddhist tradition of method. There is basic division between wisdom and method. Under method we group all the love-compassion related activities. Method means the way and how you achieve something. Generosity is without question part of method and so is love and compassion. Every effort we put in to say mantra, and most meditations, every morality, patience, enthusiasm and concentration, are all aspect of method.

The one thing left is wisdom. This is a very specific wisdom, not just the wisdom of knowing the difference between good and bad, between what to do and what not to do.

What I am going to say may not be right philosophically and logically. But for our understanding how it works, it may help. It is the question of "Who am I"? Personally, I am against asking that. I really think, "It doesn't matter whoever I am. What I really need to do is move forward. When I look for who I am I always need a point of reference. For example when I say, "I am John", or "I am Mary", it doesn't mean anything. What does make sense is saying, "I am Doctor Jo Blo of Sussex, England, in the 16th century." You have got the reference of time, 16th century, you got the place, Sussex, England and you got the name, Dr. Jo Blo. You even have the profession, medical doctor. So together that makes sense. Otherwise, just to say, "I am Mary" or "I am John", doesn't make sense. That is why I used to say that I don't care who I was, even Dr. Jo Blo of Sussex, England.

But now we are asking "who am I", in order to find out "What is me?" You can't say that in English, so you have to say "Who am I?" I can get away with it, because I am not a native English speaker. But tracing and finding out what really is that me, what constitutes me, what is the definition of me - that is the very specific wisdom we are dealing with. There are so many books and even bundles of books on this. What I have is just a drop in the bucket of a zillion of Buddha's teachings on this. All these teachings center on this question: what constitutes me, where is that me, who am I?

The way Buddha shared that with us is very interesting. It is almost like pointing to the other side, presenting different views. It is like saying: once upon a time there was a scholar who thought this and then there was another scholar who challenged these thoughts by saying this…and then there was yet another scholar who had the following thoughts. His thoughts were also challenged by another scholar who said this…..Finally, who is right? So then Buddha talks from his experience, his perspective. That is how Buddha presented wisdom. Without knowing that, if you just try to read a book that presents contradicting ideas of the mind- only school and other schools, it is very confusing. You are going to encounter this debate-style presentation in the Shantideva text. There will be arguments, counter-arguments and to refute those, more arguments. The whole wisdom chapter goes that way. You have to remember that the point they are raising is really the question of "me". Why is this important? We are all here struggling with our lives. We want something positive. The positive we think of is still very different from case to case. So the whole presentation looks like a history of philosophy. For example, looking at what is positive and good, there is a certain viewpoint that says:

Be merry, joyful, jolly, don't be miserable, don't get hung up on suffering. Even if you cry sometimes, turn the tears into tears of joy, manage your life with happy times. This is considered a good way to live your life.

Another view looks a little beyond that and says: that's not enough, because that is just the emotional level. Emotions sweep through the individual like waves on the ocean, or like the wind that blows. Positive emotions, such as faith, joy, compassion, love and so on come and then the negative ones such as hatred, obsession and jealousy. They sweep through and change the color and shape and attitude of the individual. They are not really a point of reference how to be happy. It is just the swing of the emotions, depending on a lot of conditions, such as mind, body and even on whether you had a good night's sleep or not and all kinds of things. It is a very temporary thing and can't be considered a point of reference whether to be happy or not. According to this view, happiness can be seen in whether a person over the course of their lives has a happy, stable, relaxed mind, or whether they are ruled by the temporary ups and downs of the emotions. The traditional Tibetan teachers give the example of eagles or vultures. They fly in the air without moving much. The small ones flap their wings a lot and go chi chi chi all the time. This person is capable to look at life as a whole rather than going with the temporary changes.

Another person is beyond that. It is fine to concentrate on this life, but actually it is a very short chapter in one's existence. Now comes the reincarnation back ground. From birth to death is just a very short chapter. This life may appear to be a very long melodrama when we review or preview the events of this life, but overall, it is very short. What about future lives? Are they not more important? At that point, everybody who wants to participate in the debate would have to be convinced or at least have the benefit of the doubt that future lives and previous lives exist. The question of reincarnation is extremely difficult and extremely important. This is because the progress of one's own spiritual path is really based on this recognition. Buddhist and most other ancient Asian traditions are based on accepting reincarnation. On the other hand it is extremely difficult to establish. We have a problem with that gap. We can see no one from a previous life who has come back. We see new people. We can see the whole world, every continent, but no one from a previous life. The only ones we know of having come back are the Tibetan incarnate lamas. Even in that case all you can go by is that So and so has said that a certain lama has come back as So and so. You have nothing more than words. Genes can't prove it. Even the mental attitude and character of the newly found individual are completely different from incarnation to incarnation.

One of the first reincarnations discovered in the west is Lama Yeshe's reincarnation, a young Spanish boy. A number of the old students of Lama Yeshe told me that this boy does not look, act or think the same way as the old Lama Yeshe. Naturally, because this is a different personality, no doubt about it. That adds even more on top of the confusion. On top of that there is often two incarnations of the same person. For example the Panchen Lamas. There is one recognized by the Dalai Lama and then the Chinese have recognized and enthroned somebody else as the official Panchen Lama. We also have two Karmapas. That adds even more confusion.

In the Buddhist tradition reincarnation is mainly established through logic. But even then, the logic is not easy to accept for us. Logically, reincarnation is based on continuation. So, to begin, you have to establish continuation itself. We don't have difficulty establishing the continuation of yesterday's me into today's me and last week's person into this week's person. Likewise, last year's person into this year's person. The age and looks have changed, the personality has slightly changed, because people become more mature and wise and because they change their mind. All that slightly changes but we don't have that much difficulty accepting the continuation up to that level. We accept that young elders become grown ups, that teens become young elders, that kids becomes teenagers. We get the problem at the birth level. How are we going to trace that continuation? In order to establish continuation of the person at that point we have to establish who is me.

When we ask that question, the natural answer comes up, "It is ME". That is the big ME. It is John, the carpenter, the electrician, the trouble maker, the trouble shooter. What is happening here is we are shifting gears between label, profession, address and so on. In India, any document you sign has to include "Son of …..". The question is: why are we shifting gears? It is because we cannot find the real identity. Because of that we presume that it was born at a particular time, continues for a while and then dies and disappears. This is all because we cannot find it. Birth itself is a big issue in this country alone. There is a very strong debate going on: when does it become a person, when does it become a human being? At the time of conception or a few days or weeks after that or at the time of birth? Wisdom is trying to see who is that person.

In the philosophical-historical presentation of this wisdom one person will come and say:

"The ME is something inside the physical body. Somebody is occupying it." If you ask where exactly that ME resides that person may say, "It is in the brain." Asians will say, "It is in my heart." If you ask, "Where did it come from and where is it going?" it is difficult to give an answer.

The next person comes and says, "If the ME is something else than the body, that something else has to have its own continuation." The body has definitely a continuation. Seeing, hearing, tasting and touching, everything is continuation. Our mind is continuation. So who is continuing? Is it part of your mind, your body, a combination, is it inside or outside?

Somebody will say, "It is inside the body." Then you say, "Show me. Take the body apart. Where is it? Is it my head, my heart, my legs, my hands, my chest, my ribs, my bones, my flesh, my nerves, which is it?" Then they can't point it out and say, "It might not be internal then. It is external." They say, "Because your mind is connecting with the external object, something is coming up. That is called external existence. It comes out of a mind that is acknowledging. That is the famous zen story. If a tree falls in the middle of forest and there is nobody witnessing it, does the tree really fall? The question is this: if there is such an external existence, how would it exist?

The way wisdom tries to get at these questions is almost like a laboratory. Unfortunately there is no equipment, but otherwise it is like scientists finding out what is what, not physically or chemically, but only with logical sharpness. According to my understanding, the main point Buddha was making, boils down to non-existence. That's why this particular wisdom is called "emptiness." Empty, because non-existent. Now you may say, "What do you mean, non-existent? I am very much here, sitting here, talking, eating, drinking. Here is my nose, me years, my tongue." I am mentioning that because in the Heart Sutra, the Essence of Transcendental Wisdom, it says, "no eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue…" Maharishi Yogi, Swami Muktananda and others are actually teaching that. TM, Transcendental Meditation, is trying to achieve Transcendental Wisdom. Why transcendental? It transcends beyond our projections, our imagination. This is expressed in the mantra GATE GATE PARAGATE PARASAMGATE BODHI SOHA - GONE GONE GONE BEYOND TO ENLIGHTENMENT SOHA. Allen Ginsberg's and other Beat poets' writings, like Jack Kerouac's are all concerned with that. Then from the vipassana angle that is practiced in Burma and so on, it is the same thing. You are looking inside. So the wisdom of the Asian traditions is based on that. Hindus, Buddhists, Jains and Sikhs are looking inside.

Earlier I said, "I don't care who I am". I might have overlooked the fact that at some point it is good to ignore who I am and at other times it is good to explore that. Why do you have to ignore the "I" at certain times? Because we may just want to boost our ego. "I like to find out that I was George Washington, Thomas Jefferson or Abraham Lincoln in a previous life. That would be great." That is the time to ignore the search for the "I", because the search is misdirected towards ego-boosting. When you have abandoned ego-boosting, then it is good to look for the "I", because actually, you are not going to find it. When you don't find the "I", it doesn't boost your ego, but on the contrary, it cuts your ego. It pulls the red carpet from under the feet of the ego. That is wisdom. And that is why Buddha talks about non-existence. Buddha says that deep down there is nobody, not me, not you, nobody. Non-existence however, does not mean that we are not here at all, but rather that we are not here the way we think we are. I am very much here, I am talking to you, you are listening to me. All kinds of different thoughts are going through your heads. That is all real. Or is it not? Maybe we are all dreaming that we are all in this room, sitting on uncomfortable chairs, moving around. Am I sleeping, dreaming or awake? What time is it? Twelve midnight or twelve noon? No, you are not dreaming. It is not twelve midnight. It is around twelve noon. It is us sitting here, really, the mother, the father, the brother, sister. This is reality.

How does that work now - non-existent, yet here? The answer is: dependent arising. I am here, but interdependently. I depend on my name, body, mind, causes, conditions, time - everything is conditional. I am here, because the time is right. I am here because the terms under which I can be here, are right. My body is right, my mind is right. All of those are right. Just the combination of all these factors being right is the definition of my existence. If one thing goes wrong, I cease to be here. If my body does not function, I cease to be here. If my mind does not function, I will be a crazy person. I won't be here as a properly functioning person. I don't mean just having a couple of screws loose. We all have some screws loose, but if you miss a lot of them, then you land in an institution. The dependent arising is the actual idea of existence. We don't exist truly, because we exist dependently. We do not exist independently. Our idea of "Me" being established independently is very wrong - although we work for our wholes lives to become independent. Even at the kindergarten level we are taught to become independent.

In Chapter Nine of Shantideva's Bodhisattvacharyatara there are debates trying to establish an external "me", an internal "me" and even mind only. The mind only proponents say that only the mind matters. According to Buddha even that is wrong. Yes, mind plays a very important part. But likewise the body does. So mind-only is very wrong. There are a lot of reasons. There are countless reasonings. Which mind is being talked about in the first place? The mind that sees, hears and feels, or what kind of mind?

So, finding out about wisdom is really like a laboratory, where you take apart body and mind and find out about all the parts and where they fit. That's what wisdom is all about. At the end you will find that just the combination of all makes something exist. Take for example a clock. There are so many parts interacting that make the hands of the clock move. One little wheel pushes the other and it has to be powered either by winding it up or by putting a battery in. You got all these parts, put them in a little box and call the whole thing "clock". That is how a clock is established. Just like that, "me" is going to be established. That is the interdependently arising me. That is the emptiness of me.

We always want it to be the end of the Russian doll. We always want to see "This is it". But we are never going to find it. The scientists too have been looking for the smallest particle. They found atoms and thought, "That's it". But there was more. And more and more. There is a mantra called "essence of interdependence", it goes

om ye dharma hetun trabhawa / hetun tekan tathagato ewam denta / tekan tsa yo nirodha ewam wadi / maha shramanaye soha.

The essence of interdependence is that now matter how small and subtle it may go there will never be the end of existence. There never will be the smallest Russian doll. That is what Buddha said 2600 years ago. In other words Buddha says that east never touches west. That is the essence of interdependence. East depends on west and west depends on east. If there is no east, how can there be west? If there is no west, how can there be east?

If east meets west, they merge into one another. This side depends on that side. Without that side, this side is not there. In politics we always want an enemy. We had the fascists, then the communists, then Saddam Hussein. It looks like it is because we depend for our existence on the other side. I am joking - don't take that seriously. The Democrats seem to depend on the Republicans and vice versa, otherwise they can't function. The statement of Buddha tells us two important things about how things are established. One is that no matter how subtle and small you go, there is no end. Everything is dividable.

That means that if you put anything into open space, no matter how big or how small, it will divide space. That very moment the directions are created and that object has sides, eastern, western, southern, northern. And that is how it becomes dividable. This automatically happens. The same goes for time. If there are no physical forms, there is still time. The past never touches the future. The past continues into the future, but it never becomes future. So there is division in the realm of form, but even the form-less is dividable. Wherever you look, this happens. The scientists today agree with that.

In the spiritual path it is therefore established that there is no such thing as an indivisible self. It is divided by sides, by time and everything. This refutes indivisibility. And that raises a lot of questions regarding our thoughts, ideas and projections of our self.

This is the basis of wisdom, of emptiness, of the lack of independent existence. Perhaps establishing emptiness establishes interdependence. Establishing interdependence establishes terms and conditions. That in turn establishes cause and result. That establishes karma. Karma establishes individual responsibility. Individual responsibility establishes that we are our own protector, as Nagarjuna had said

You are your own leader, you are your own protector. You are responsible for

yourself.

From the dismantling point of view, you can dismantle everything. From the establishing point of view, you can very well establish yourself, as your own leader. That is the basis of karma. That is the basis of the independence of the individual. That is the basis of self-determination of the individual's life.

after lunch…….

I am glad you are all back. It is a good sign that you are not so bored.

Some time ago in a center in Bloomington, India a geshe from India came to teach. The first day there were 35 people. The teaching was supposed to go for seven days. He was hard to follow. Every session the number of participants dropped. By the third day the sponsor told the lama: "You don’t have to teach any more now, because nobody is coming!!" The geshe was telling stories from the lam rim, for example that in Buddha's time a monk was accused of stealing a calf. The monk denied doing it and he actually didn't. But the others didn't believe him and searched his place. He was cooking something and he said that he was coloring his robes. But when they looked in the pot it was a whole calf boiling in there! The Buddha said that he actually didn't steal the calf but that because of his karma of getting blamed the whole incident actually materialized. Buddhists really believe that it works that way. But these sorts of things we don't tell you people (great laughter from the audience). This lama did tell it and it was so unbelievable to the listeners that they all left!!

But this is how Buddha taught. His teachings happened because of a whole series of incidents. People would come to Buddha and tell him something and he would explain why it happened. If you follow the stories and take them literally, sometimes it seems unbelievable. If this monk didn't steal the calf, how did it get into his cooking pot? Did it jump into the pot by itself? Maybe it is like in this part of the world, when a deer jumps in front of your car!! Maybe the calf did jump into the pot!!

But the vinaya stories are like that. Almost all the vinaya rules came up that way. The vinaya teachings are the morality teachings of Buddha. They tell you about the vows and what kind of behavior breaks the vows. When you go against your vows, that is considered immoral. When I was young, I was in the monastery and had the opportunity to study the Five Subjects: transcendental wisdom, logic, wisdom aspects, vinaya and metaphysics. In the monasteries we spend decades studying these. Out of all these five, for me the easiest were the vinaya subjects. Unfortunately I am no longer a monk, so the vinaya becomes useless for me. But that is the subject I learnt most easily. Maybe it was because of my age. I started my training at age 4-5. By the time I reached the vinaya level, I must have been 15-16. I remembered the vinaya much better and understood much easier. You can go and debate, read and argue, but that doesn't mean that you have learnt it at all. But still, vinaya was the easiest for me.

Vinaya is also like history. Buddha never said that when you take this and that vow you can't do this and you have to do that. He gave all different vows, novice vows, full-fledged monks- and nuns vows. But in the monastic community then somebody would do something funny and the people would come to Buddha and tell him, "So and so did this and that. Is that right?" Then Buddha would say, "No, that is not right" and that is how all these rules came up. It has been completely incident after incident after incident. Each time they went to Buddha and asked, "Is it okay to do that?" and Buddha would say, "No, that is not okay." Lets say, some monk was having sex with a cow or a buffalo and the monks would go to Buddha and ask, "Is that okay?" and he would say, "No, that's not okay." The vinaya has completely been built that way. The rules on stealing developed that way too. Somebody took somebody's things. They asked Buddha what to do about it and he said, "That is certainly not okay. This is called stealing. It is terrible and hurts the people." Then the different rules and levels of stealing came in. For example, the thing that you steal has to be of value to the owner. Without value you cannot measure the act of stealing. Then a question came up about a particular act of stealing. Somebody had hung some shirts to dry. One monk came by and tried to steal one shirt. In the hurry he grabbed two. Only when he came home he found out that he had taken two. Buddha said it was an act of stealing, but he only got the full downfall of stealing one, because that was his intention. For stealing the second shirt, he only got half of one downfall. In that case he didn't have the motivation wanting to steal it and also not the satisfaction at the end, thinking, "Now I got two shirts." This half-downfall is called "bumpo", meaning thickness, in Tibetan. It is heavy, but not a full downfall. This is how the vinaya came together. When you look at the ancient stories that are at the base of it, it looks almost unbelievable. People sometimes get bored, sometimes it sounds interesting and even unbelievable.

Of all teachings, the aspect you are likely to get most bored with are actually the wisdom aspects, figuring out "who am I". This is very important and very difficult. According to the Buddhist traditional way you are supposed to present all the non-buddhist views first, starting with the anti-buddhist schools and their thoughts. Then you go into the buddhist views and find out how they refute the early Indian thoughts. As a matter of fact, His Holiness gave that very teaching in the Beacon Theatre in New York City over four days a couple of years ago. It was really very hard. A great number of people kept on attending it, because it was His Holiness who was teaching. His Holiness himself commented during the teaching that he had heard that it was very hard for people and he said, "I am sorry it is hard, but don't forget." His Holiness then blamed the text book author Jamyang Shepa for making it so hard by quoting Geshe Sherab Gyaltsen. He was a very famous geshe in the 1940s and 50s. He also became the president of the Buddhist Association of China. He visited India and Sri Lanka in that capacity. Geshe Sherab Gyaltsen said, after reading Jamyang Shepa's work himself, "It is not smooth. It is like two stones touching together. It is tough."

Actually, it is the subject itself that is tough. It is not His Holiness's fault, nor Jamyang Shepa's. It is just really difficult. When you are searching for the definition of the self you have to look carefully. It is extremely difficult to find. According to traditional early Indian Buddhist texts there are four main schools of thoughts. All of them are talking about the presentation of the Two Truths.

In Buddhism there are always two truths. Normally, we think that truth has to be one. If this is right, then the other should be wrong. But Buddha said there are two truths. This is different from the Four Noble Truths. Existence consists of two truths. I think it was Nagurjuna who said,

The person with total knowledge, without having to listen to other people's views, has described all of existence as part of the two truths. There is never a third truth. These truths are the relative and the absolute truth.

When we hear 'relative', we may think that it is sort of true in a way, but not really. According to the Buddha that is not right. Of course, absolute truth is true, but relative truth is also true. The presentation of the two truths is the basic foundation on which you build your path or practice. Buddha always emphasizes, "If you are interested in the spiritual path you should be grounded, not flying." Chogyam Trungpa Rimpoche called that "Love and Light". I don't know exactly what he meant. I shouldn't quote his words so much; that can get me into trouble. For example, he also used the term "Spiritual Materialism". I used that term a couple of times and apparently he had written a whole book with that title, but didn't really explain spiritual materialism according to that book. That is what I was told. Then, I was interviewed by Shambala Magazine, which belongs to Trungpa Rimpoche's group. They asked me to talk about spiritual materialism. I was not really sure what Trungpa Rimpoche had in mind when he used that term. But I think he seemed to use it in the sense of people who are not really grounded. However, he also used the term "love and light". So then in the interview I had to come up with something that is right. I took if from the level of attachment to basic material things up to the level of contaminated mind. I made a very big explanation of spiritual materialism. This is because I know that Trungpa Rimpoche mixed in the explanations on ego into the subject of spiritual materialism. In that sense ego is the direct opponent of the path of seeing. The article became quite long and I think went over 10 or even 14 pages. So, with that in mind, I better not talk about love and light too much, otherwise I have to explain it in detail.

Normally I use 'love and light' in the sense of flying, not being grounded. I am not necessarily only referring to people who are doing the spiritual shopping, going through the spiritual yellow pages. But there are some people who seem to be very strongly dedicated to a certain spiritual path. However, that person him-or herself may not be well grounded in themselves. In Tibet we have the saying lama pe sung dribu tor song. The lama has come, the bell has rung and that was it. In the Indian culture there is a similar expression aya ram jaya ram - Ram has come, Ram has gone. That happens to a lot of our spiritual practitioners. The practice is there, I am saying the words, I say the mantras, I ring the bell, I wash my feet, but there is no effect at all. Spiritual practice has to effect the individual. Otherwise it is useless. That is one thing. Then grounding the individual in the practice is the next thing. First you have to be effected. You have to feel it, see that it is helping, that it is bringing a positive change. That is important. Otherwise, change always happens anyway. Even the dogs and cats change our lives. We all know that. When you look at the spiritual field, you are looking for change for the better. When you realize it changes your life, that it is helpful and you like it, then you want to keep doing it.

To me, that level - that is my personal view - is the view of someone who is interested. There is some give and take. There is gain and there is some effect. But you are not really in it yet. You may be spending two or even five hours a day, but even then you are not really in there. You are interested, you say the mantras, you like to show off a little bit. That is that level.

The grounding is much more than that. You have to know where you are standing. You have to know what you are standing on. Then you have to know what you are doing, where you are going with that, how far you can reach, what you hope to gain out of that. All of that has to be taken completely into consideration and has to be woven into your whole practice. That is what I would begin to call grounded. In order to get this grounding, the base and foundation on which we stand, according to Buddha, is the two truths, the absolute and relative truths.

Truly speaking, the spiritual practice is based on that. But even where I come from, from my background, the good old great spiritual country of old Tibet, I didn't learn it that way, but first learnt by saying prayers and mantras. Coming from that direction was one thing, and then we came in from the direction of studying. Then at the end, the prayers and mantras and what you have learnt in your studies will meet. They fit each other. This takes time. First you memorize and just follow, without knowing anything. That is the old-fashioned way. But even you people are very kind, saying all these prayers in Tibetan. You are happy to say it, but probably are not getting anything. Many people have memorized many of the Tibetan prayers. It amazed me that Philip Glass had the whole lama chopa memorized and also the whole long sadhanas of Yamantaka, Vajrayogini and Heruka - all in Tibetan. That is really amazing, and I don't expect everybody to do that. But the point is, it is good to have the words memorized, whether in Tibetan or in English. Then one day, they will click with you. Not only the commentaries we have given you, but even by yourself there will be moments where you say, "Oh, this is what that is all about." You will begin to understand. It clicks. When that happens you are really becoming quite good.

Let me talk more about the two truths. All the following arguments and counter-arguments are based on the two truths. I am going to give you the explanation of the two truths, although according to the traditional teachings that is absolutely wrong. That is not the way I learnt. Traditionally, the teacher will let the student find out what it is, leave it up to them. Then you will learn better. If I tell you straight away, it goes against your capacity to learn, to pick it up. But anyway, there we are in the mid-west, in Michigan, in the middle of nowhere. That's what it is - honestly. I am Michigander myself, so don't get upset with me. But somehow, since this is the 21st century, everything is supposed to be easily available at your finger tips.

Truth is divided into two. So both have to be true. There is absolute and relative. The emptiness that Buddha talked about, all the talk about self, "I", existence and non-existence, and so on, is based on these two truths. In absolute truth, nothing exists. I don't exist, you don't exist, nothing exists. But in the relative truth, we all do exist. I function and you function. Everything works perfectly, according to how we know it works. That is the relative truth. In absolute reality nothing exists.

Now, this gives you some kind of funny confusion. Yes, I did say that absolutely we don't exist. But that does not mean that we don't exist at all. If we did exist in the absolute, we would have to exist independently. If we exist independently, we should not exist dependently. This looks like a word game. But when you look closer, you find that we do exist dependently, don't we? If we don't have a body, we become a ghost or spirit. Maybe that's a good thing - a free spirit, right? [laughs]. But when you become a spirit you don't exist as a human being. So we do depend on our body. It becomes our identity. The best identification we have right now is our physical appearance. It is far better than a driver's license or passport, which are issued by the Secretary of State and the National Passport Center. This is definitely a far better identity. You know, in our culture, if you don't have a Social Security Number, driver's license and credit card or birth certificate, you virtually don't exist in our system, do you? Truly, you don't. But we are here. So we have a better identity in our physical identity than in all these different numbers, such as credit card, bank account, social security and all kinds of account numbers. For old people like me there is the medicare account. We depend on it. We almost don't exist if we don't have these.

Likewise, in general, if we don't have relative truth we don't exist at all. We depend on our identity, our mind, our conditions, our terms - everything. When everything is just right, we exist. All conditions have to be right. That is called dependent arising. We exist dependently. That is good enough to be existing. We do not exist independently, because we do exist dependently. So, not existing independently, absolutely, does not mean you don't exist. Did you get it? It is a little bit like a tongue twister, like she sells sea shells on the sea shore or Peter Pepper picked the pickled pepper. If Peter Pepper picked the pickled pepper, where is the pickled pepper which Peter Pepper picked?

It may sound similar when you say: it doesn't exist absolutely, but relative it does exist. If you exist dependently, you don't exist independently. Not existing independently means that you don't exist absolutely, which is not good enough not be existing. See? However, if you exist dependently, it is good enough to exist. That is how we establish the two truths.

I don't blame anyone who doesn't understand this right away. We went through this for years. Absolutely we do not exist; that is the absolute truth. Relatively we do. That is the relative truth. That does not mean we really do exist or don’t. We don't want to say that. To say that relatively we do exist is good enough. It is good enough to be able to function. The point of existence, whether it is right or wrong, is based on whether it is functioning. Traditional teachings tell us: lets say you are riding a horse on the high plateau. There are no other people. In the distance you can see something that looks like it could be a human being. It could also be a tree stump or a piece from a collapsed wall. You think, "There is person coming this way. I will ask them whether I am riding in the right direction." Within this plateau there are some canal-type of valleys, so from time to time you go down and come up again. For a while you don't see anyone. You think that the other person is coming closer, but all of a sudden a different person pops up. You ask that person, "What happened to the other person I have been seeing? The one with the whitish-looking dress? He should be here by now." The other guy now says, "That was not a person; that was just an old tree stump."

The idea of having seen a human being, projecting that he or she is coming closer to you, has been completely refuted by the perfect mind of this other human being who had come that way, telling you, "This is not a person, but a tree stump." Now you no longer think that there is a human being, but you think it is a tree stump. Next time you come up from a canyon and look at that thing you will think, "Yes, it really is a tree stump." You will see it as a tree stump and function in relation to it correctly. We call that a reliable source. When a reliable source contradicts our projection or imagination, then the rule for us is to accept that our view was wrong. If you don't accept the evidence you are a "stubborn person". A stubborn person would insist in the face of being told that it was a tree stump, "No, no, you are wrong, it is a person. I am going to prove to you that it is a person. I have to get there and show you." This is called stubborn-ness. On the wisdom path the stubborn ones don't pick up the wisdom. Stubborn-ness is an obstacle to understanding. Understanding depends on the logical reasons. Logical reasoning is a reliable source. If a reliable source contradicts you, you can't remain stubborn.

But it is not always the case. A reliable source, which is supposed to be a reliable source, can be wrong. You cannot rule that out either. In one statement, Chandrakirti says, "If everybody has accepted something, don't go against it." On the other hand, there are new discoveries, new knowledge and there is something to gain sometimes by going against the current or against what is commonly accepted. So even the reliability can become questionable.

The question still is: Who am I? For me the answer should be easy: I come from Tibet. But that is the relative truth. Absolutely, I don't know where I come from. Probably from everywhere. If you think from the reincarnation point of view, we do come from everywhere. According to the idea of reincarnation there is no such life that we didn't have before. There is no such place that we have never been born in before. That is what Buddha himself said. I consider Buddha to be a reliable source, yet even his statements are interpretable. Interpretation is one of the biggest problems in Buddhism. You always have to check if Buddha's statements are interpretable or literal. It is just like with the two truths. Who knows where to put what, but I can tell you that the statement on reincarnation is not interpretable. I am joking! Actually, these are the spiritual problems we see in Buddhism. The results coming out in form of Buddha's statements are tremendous. But there are the problems of interpretation. We have to overcome all of these.

This is mainly in relation to the wisdom aspects. If you are looking for a simple practice, and want to become a good person and so on, there is also a huge room for that in Buddhism. We welcome anybody in Buddhism who wants to do that, and in that case you only have to follow the system. But actually, in the long run that is not encouraged. Buddha really encourages us to be our own judge. Buddha himself repeatedly said, "Don't buy it on the basis that I said so. If you believe something because I, the Buddha, said so, it is an unreliable reasoning." That is considered to be the worst kind of reasoning. You have nothing else to say in order to explain your words, so you have to drag the Buddha down and say, "It is true, because the Buddha said so. Are you are going to accept what I said or are you rebelling against Buddha?" That is the most pathetic way of establishing a point of wisdom. Every point you want to establish actually needs wisdom. Even if you want to say OM MANI PADME HUM, you need wisdom. Being generous, giving a piece of food to a hungry dog needs wisdom as well. You want to keep good morality. That needs wisdom. You want to be an enthusiastic person. That needs wisdom. You want to be compassionate. That needs wisdom. Buddha even said,

Wisdom is the only one that sees; all others are blind. If you want to lead a bunch of blind people to the city of happiness, you need a guide. Wisdom is that guide.

You can never reach to enlightenment, you never reach the result of the spiritual practice, without wisdom. You also don't have the base on which you stand - the two truths. We human beings stand on two legs. The spiritual practice is based on the two truths, absolute and relative. All these verses, chapter after chapter, are the historical presentation of the absolute truth - of me. It is not just the absolute truth of something on the other side over there, no. It is about me. I am talking about everyone of us. It is our absolute truth.

Lets read now from Shantideva's root text, the ninth chapter of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara. We had reached up to verse 18. This verse tells you that the sword, no matter how sharp it is, cannot cut itself. No matter how bright the lamp, it cannot make itself clear.

Verse 18

Just as a sword cannot cut itself, so it is with the mind.

[just as a lamp cannot illuminate itself..]

Mind cannot perceive mind. Self cannot grasp self. Because of that the idea of external and internal existence came up. This is the thought by a particular school, "I am inside of my, but the me from inside comes up outside of me. Because you can see me and acknowledge me, I suddenly pop up." The definition of existence is something that can be acknowledged, seen, used. So this school argues, "If you don't see yourself, nobody else can see you and therefore you don't exist. So I have to see myself and in order to see myself I have to get outside of me."

One Buddhist school therefore says, "Yes, I can see myself", and another school will say, "No it is impossible to see oneself." These are the different interpretations according to the different schools. Self-seeing is called in Tibetan rang rig. The question is whether it is possible to see myself. [= whether mind can recognize itself] A logical refutation is: "No you can't. You can see anything, but you can't perceive yourself, just like a sword, no matter how sharp it is, can never cut itself."

Likewise, a light is very clear, it makes everything clear. But a light cannot shine light on itself. Why? If light can shine on itself, then darkness can also block itself. So darkness would have to block darkness. But how can be possible? Darkness is darkness. What do I mean by blocking? For example if I take my scarf off and put it over this glass of water, then you can't see the glass, because the scarf hides the glass. But that does not work with darkness. Darkness cannot cover darkness. Darkness cannot block darkness. Darkness is darkness. Therefore, since darkness cannot cover darkness, and light cannot illuminate itself and a sword cannot cut itself, you cannot perceive yourself. Self cannot see self. This is how the debate goes.

verse 19

The second point in this argument is about jewels. This is about the blue color. We are reading mainly from Alan Wallace's translation. There is another translation, by Stephen Batchelor, but that has commentary mixed in. He says,

Take for example two kinds of blueness, blueness that appears in dependence on another blue-colored object, like the blue reflected in a clear piece of glass. Then there is the blueness that does not appear in dependence on something else, like the actual color of blue in blue lapis lazuli.

The comparison between blue glass and blue colored objects is used here. One school states: "self can see self - just like blue glass." This is meant in the sense that glass by nature is clear, not blue. Normally, glass is not blue. By nature it is not blue. However, it can be effected to look blue. If you take a blue piece of cloth and put one of these paper weights made of clean-clear glass on top of it, then because of the reflection of the cloth that paperweight looks blue. That's one side. Another type of blue object is the lapis lazuli, the semi-precious stone. These stones come mostly from Afghanistan. If the Afghanis don't keep themselves busy producing opium they have this natural resource. Unfortunately, for the last decades they only produce opium. That's why they are very rich. Their natural karmic resource, however, is lapis lazuli, like the Middle East has oil and South Africa has diamonds - if they let them go - and the Burmese have rubies. Geographically, Mother Earth has provided enough for everybody to use, however, nowadays, we don't do that. We do different things.

Anyway, lapis lazuli is glass-like, but by nature it is already blue. The blueness is not dependent on other conditions. Likewise, the self seen by us, including the five skandhas, could be of two types, one that is depending on other factors and one that can function independently. So, in answer to the school that holds the view that self cannot see self, the other school says that there are two categories: glass that is effected by a blue cloth, so it looks blue and then on the other hand lapis lazuli, which is naturally blue. So you have both. With that they are trying to counter the argument that self cannot see self, just like a sword cannot cut itself and the light cannot shine on itself and darkness cannot cover darkness. So they use the blueness-example to show that there are two kinds of self, one that is naturally self-seeing and another self that is dependent on other factors. That is how they keep their argument going.

Now again, there is a counter-argument to that point. And that says: The statement that lapis lazuli's blueness doesn't depend on other factors is a wrong statement. Lapis lazuli does depend on the lapis lazuli's causes and conditions. Lapis lazuli is created. Existence is basically divided into two categories: created and uncreated. This is not saying that one is natural and one is not. Today we often divide things in whether they are natural or chemical, right? Sometimes we also divide natural and artificial. Chemicals are not necessarily artificial. They can be real. But they are not naturally made.

Audience: What about natural flavoring and artificial flavorings though? Artificial flavorings are synthesized through chemical processes. Artificial flavorings are just as adulterated and mixed up as chemical ones, but they came from a plant.

Rimpoche: Still, there is a general perception in society that natural things are good and other, made-up ones are not good. However, yesterday I learnt on CNN that all the coloring in "natural foods", like juices and so on comes from beetles, some kind of insects. They were even talking about whether that was kosher or not. A rabbi thought it was not kosher. Also could it still be considered to be vegetarian or not? In any case it would also be naturally flavored. This is quite confusing. I get myself often confused by the use of the words "nature" and "natural".

Audience: Mipham's is saying in his commentary u ma gyen that you can't look at the two truths as separate. Relative truth will reveal the absolute. Whether you are call something artificial or natural, in truth they are both chemical, if you know your periodic table.

Rimpoche: That is right. Absolute and relative truths both function on one base. Both are reality. Absolute truth has to be found on the basis of the relative truth. I always make the statement that when you are looking for emptiness don't look for empty or zero, but look into existence. The idea of emptiness comes because things are created. So it doesn't mean that there is nothing there. That would be nihilistic and not the position of the centrist or madhyamaka or middle way school. The point of reference of the middle is to be free from the two extremes. These are the extremes of nihilism and existentialism. The true wisdom is the middle way, not as extreme as George Bush and not as extreme as John Kerry, but in the middle - like Hillary. [great laughter from Rimpoche and audience]. I am kidding.

Now you go and search for the self, whether the body or the mind is me, keep on searching, whether I exist in oneness with the body or separately from it. If I exist in oneness, then since I have five physical aspects such as form, sound, smell, taste and touch, which one is the me? Or do I have five me's? If there are five me's, I would be schizophrenic [Rimpoche: schizophreniac]. Nobody wants to be a schizophreniac, but at least you would be free of loneliness! But that is not good enough to be free. So it is not oneness with form.

Now you check if the "I" is separate from body and mind and look if it is somewhere outside. You have to do this, because the "I" is not findable. You assume that if it were really there you should be able to see it. So you go looking for it. In the American culture we would say, "Come out, show yourself." It is never going to show. You could sit there till the cows come home. So the only thing you can do is trace it, but when you do that you cannot find it. When you conclude that you are not there at all you become nihilistic, because relatively you do exist. You are functioning. The basis of good and bad deeds, helping and hurting and all of those must exist. The functioning aspect should relieve you of the nihilistic extreme. I am going to contradict even that later on, but not now. Otherwise I destroy everything. Those who have been studying with me for some years will know how that is also contradicted. That is according to the verses of the Three Principles of the Path.

Further, appearance eliminates the extreme of existence.

Emptiness eliminates non-existence.

Emptiness itself is cause and effect.

Understanding this protects from these extremes

That is one more twist oh the subject. But before you go into this twist you have to hold on for a while, otherwise you slip through and bounce everywhere. That's why the Buddha chose to teach the wisdom through the historical development of the different schools. It is going through how these views came up and contradicted each other and proved the different views wrong, until at the end there is something left which is correct. You have eliminated everything else and the one thing left has to be the truth.

Here being free from nihilism is through seeing existence. You are functioning. You are eating, drinking. Don't you sleep, don't you yell and scream? Don't you walk? So who is walking? It is not Dead Man walking, it is a person walking there.

So the point is to cut the nihilism as well as the existentialism. These are the two extremes that you don't want to fall into. If you do you really go completely wrong. Being free from the two extremes, you are in the center. That is the Middle Path. I cannot be the body and the body cannot be me. If my body is me, am I oneness with the body or separate? If I am oneness, then just as I have 5 different physical aspects, I should be five me's. If I am separate, how can I function as a person, what would be the connection?

Yes, I am not my body, but I depend on my body. It is very hard for people to see that that is not me. We do say sometimes that it is just my body but not me. We do depend on the body, otherwise we become spirits. The way I exist is a dependently arising person. Thus dependent existence eliminates independent existence. Why do people walk with a walking stick? Because they cannot do without. They depend on the walking stick, unless the walking stick is just used as show biz (like Charlie Chaplin). Depending on the walking stick means you are not functioning independently. Functioning dependently is good enough to walk. Walking with a walking stick is good enough walking. Likewise, relatively existing is good enough to be existing.

If there are no questions I am going to close the shop now.

Audience: Talking about relative and absolute truth, is the emptiness of good and bad karma included into these two truths? How would that we understood in terms of reincarnation?

Rimpoche: Karmic functioning is included normally in relative truth. That is very much connected with the functioning of impermanence. Every impermanent and karmic function is a matter concerned with relative truth. The absolute truth of karma is emptiness. The emptiness of karma itself is the absolute truth of karma. Again, that emptiness does not mean empty. It is dependent arising.

Audience: Does the beginningless and endless mind stream exist in the absolute truth?

Rimpoche: Yes. I am not sure about beginningless and endless. According to the Buddha every being is beginningless. It is very much like saying that all souls are old souls. That is very much within Buddhism too, because of the reincarnation. The ending is a different story.

Audience: When we are doing this investigation, are we trying to overcome our intellectual ideas of emptiness? When we meditate on that we are getting the direct realization, right?

Rimpoche: No, I don't think so. Without the process of analyzing you will never get there. Analyzing will find some kind of definition of wisdom itself. Then you meditate on that with focused concentration meditation. That will bring stabilization within that. The philosophical exercises we are doing here, are the analytical meditation on wisdom.

When you are doing an analytical meditation on the Buddha's image, that would be figuring out how bid the head is, putting the legs together with the body in between and then combining all the aspects into one image. Analytical meditation on emptiness is what we have been doing here, thinking about what is the self, what are the two truths, how we exist, in oneness with or separately from the body and keep on tracing the self, until you begin to see, "Wow, it is not there. There is nothing to pick. Yet it is functioning. There is a base for karma to function." You find that terms and conditions must be just right, so it is a dependent existence. This balances between the extremes of existentialism and nihilism. That is called the Middle Path. That is the true emptiness of ourselves. First you learn this theoretically, then you project an image and third you have the direct encounter. If you don't learn it first here you will never find it.

Audience: Isn't there a difference between intellectually formed views of the self that are delusional and innate ones? Does the philosophical part overcome the obstacles to the constructed view of the self?

Rimpoche: No, all of them.

Audience: So what is in the transcendental wisdom then?

Rimpoche: This is the transcendental wisdom (prajnaparamita). This is GATE GATE PARAGATE… and the third GATE is the path of seeing. I guess I can close shop now. We are really just trying to break ground, nothing has really gone through yet. Next time we meet on Saturday, March 25.

We also have a tsoh offering today. One of our teachers who has been here a number of times, Ribur Rimpoche, has passed away two weeks ago. This tsoh is a ritual that connects Tibetan Buddhism with Tibetan culture. We do something special every 7th day, for seven weeks.

20060604GRAABODHI9

Good morning and welcome everybody here today. I don't know why you want to be here in the dark room, when there is beautiful sun shine out there. You should be roaming around outside, enjoying the weather, but you chose to be in the dark room here.

We are supposed to continue with the wisdom chapter of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara and I don't even know where we are anymore. I do have a Tibetan book which I used for that and had made marks on, but I took it to Holland last time and sent it back by mail and it has not arrived back yet. I do have an English copy, but that doesn't help me. It looks like last time we met back in January, when we covered verse 17-19. That is the debate between the Cittamatrin and Madhyamaka.

Before we go back into this, we need to retrace how we got there. We spent a long time on the Bodhisattvacharyavatara, ten years altogether up to now. By reading every chapter, verse by verse, we have finally come to the 9th chapter, the wisdom chapter.

I also taught over a long period of time on the lam rim, over many week ends. That is where the long lam rim transcripts in 4 volumes comes from. However, I never went into detail into the 5th and 6th paramitas. In the last 2 years, then we spent more time on the 5th paramita, during the 8th chapter of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara and simultaneously, during the teaching of the 5th paramita of the lam rim, last year in New York. The result of that is the transcript GOM.

So now we are on the 9th chapter on wisdom. Parallel to that, in New York, we talk about the wisdom chapter of the lam rim chen mo. I thought at first, within a year we would be able to conclude that. But no - two years are gone and we are still nowhere. It looks like we are going to spend a 3rd year on it. As a result we should be doing a nice, basic wisdom teaching.

When we started doing the teachings with the Foundation of Perfection and Ganden Lha Gyema, and the Three Principal Aspects of the Path, we found the essence of all of them together. There is the wisdom aspect and the compassion aspects, all together. No matter wherever you look, somehow the teachings give you all of them, whether in detailed or short form. It is a comprehensive form for people to be able to practice.

In my absence last month, the Losseling abbot came and gave the Three Principal Aspects of the Teaching. He did spend a little more time on the wisdom part and gave a very good teaching. Of course the translator, Geshe Lobsang Tendzin Negi, a geshe himself, is also very good and he translated much more than what Khen Rimpoche actually said. Khen Rimpoche would give 3, 4 short explanations for every verse and Geshe-la made the translation very long, in order to communicate. He is also a very good geshe. That's why I think the teaching went very well and Geshe-la is using a lot of interesting English vocabulary.

In that teaching, Khen Rimpoche spoke one sentence and in that one sentence, explained emptiness according to the four different Buddhist schools of philosophy. Geshe-la translated it very long. But this passage was very good and I would like to remind you of that sentence.

Emptiness has all to do with the object of negation, whether you call it self or ego or whatever. The four Buddhist schools did exist in early India, before Buddhism came to Tibet.

The first, lowest school is called Chettramawa in Tibetan. In Sanskrit it is Vaibasika. There is also a non-Buddhist school called Chetrakpa. They consider some kind of bible-type of book to be the ultimate truth. In Tibet we don't use many Sanskrit terms. We try to only use it for mantras and for a few names, if we have to. And the pronunciation is probably quite wrong. Some of our Jewel Heart friends, when they go to university to learn Sanskrit will pronounce for example Nagarjuuna the way I say it and the Sanskrit professors will correct them. They will say it has to be Nagaaaarrrjuna.

The Chettramawa schools has 18 different sub-groups. The differentiation is based mostly on the vinaya rules, the discipline of the monks and nuns. However, because of the moral issues, there were differentiations in the emblems on the robes of the biskhus. Some use lotus, some a wheel, some a conch shell and so on.

Otherwise, the monks' robes are all made out of cut pieces of cloth. All the monks wear yellow and red with a little floppy thing. Later, additional things got stitched over and they could be made from expensive cloth. During the Buddha's time, originally, the benefactors would give beautiful materials for the bikshus to wrap themselves in. They were not supposed to keep much extra clothes. So the benefactors used to offer expensive materials for them to wrap around their bodies. Some of the monks developed strong attachment to the materials because of the good quality. So the Buddha said, "Cut them into pieces and stitch them back together." When they asked how to cut them he said, "Look at the western people, how they grow crops in their fields." So he recommended to cut them up just like the parcels of farm land, according to the irregular size and shape of the fields. Some a little this way, some a little that way. So there were many torn pieces.

There is a similar story about Milarepa. He used to sit in his cave naked. He didn't want any attachment to anything. So he sat naked. His niece came to see him sometimes, but she felt very shy to see him totally naked. One day she found a piece of woolen material and gave that to him, saying, "Please use it to cover your "extras"". She meant for him to just wrap it round the lower part of his body. Milarapa, however, didn't want to develop any attachment. So he cut that material in lots of pieces and separately covered each finger and each toe and also made one cover for his sex organ. Next time his niece came she got a shock! She said, 'I worked so hard to get that piece of cloth and now you have cut it up in such a useless way." But Milarepa had cut it in order to avoid attachment.

That is why Buddha's monks also cut the cloth that they used for their robes. Due to the different way of cutting, different systems and with that, different emblems came in. On that basis, 18 different schools developed within the Chettramawa school alone.

Out of all these schools the nema pupe deba is the only one that identifies the ego or self or object of negation differently from others. It is a very gross level of identifying it. Each different school has a different level. That one is a very gross level. Here we are talking about wisdom, and in particular about emptiness. Emptiness has become a very well-known terminology, which has actually been introduced by the very well known Tibetologists and Buddhologists. In Tibet it is called tong nyi. the nyi should be understood as "suchness". What does suchness mean to you? We know that word from the offerings that we make. There is outer, inner, secret and suchness offering. What does suchness mean here?

Audience: Just, only the barest.

Audience: You can't stick it, it is ungraspable.

Rimpoche: It is the gist of it, whatever it is, almost like what truly exists. The nyi in Tibetan conveys that. In English it becomes empti-ness. What does -ness mean?

Audience: It just makes an adjective into a noun.

Rimpoche: In my understanding it is trying to tell you that it is not nothing. It is something. Empty means there is nothing. The wallet is empty means that there is no money. When I drink water from my glass, it becomes half empty - although in our culture we prefer to say "half full". We may even say "a quarter full" rather than "three quarters empty".

Audience: what do you mean by essence? Like the essence of flowers, like perfume?

Rimpoche: You think it is like spraying "Samsara" in the air? Isn't that made from Elizabeth Taylor's diamonds?

Audience: No, her brand is called "White Diamonds". "Samsara" is not hers.

Rimpoche: Is that right? Then I should have used "White Diamonds" as example. The tricky part is that we are always trying to hold on to something. The Tibetologists and Buddhologists get some idea about tong nyi, but it not enough to say "empty", they want to attribute something more than that. They would like to say that it is empty, but yet there is something. So they use words like empti-ness or such-ness. If you make that strongly into an "essence", especially "White Diamonds", then it becomes something very solid.

Therefore, in the beginning, when we learn about emptiness we are better off to think just "empty". At the same time we have to know that it doesn't mean that there is nothing. But let us stick with "empty".

Then you have to think, "Empty of what?" Sometimes emptiness is called voidness. Sometimes also just "void". Void means empty, nothing left - gone.

Audience: we use the term: into the void - some vast space or nothingness. It is almost another word for empty space.

Rimpoche: into the void seems to mean that there was something here and now it has gone into nothing. These all indicate that something has to be negated. Something has to be lost. Something has to be missed. Something has to be gone. First and foremost this is the idea. That is why Tsongkhapa says in "The Three Principles of the Path", "Don't look for emptiness, look for interdependence". This is true. If you look for the empty, you are not going to find that. But what is missing in here is our object of study. We call that "object of negation". What are we negating? That is step 1.

In order to realize empty, you have to find empty of what. That is the object of negation. When you are presenting the object of negation, you will find that there is a gross object of negation, a subtle object of negation, and a very subtle object of negation. So the very gross level is tak chig ra wa kyen gi dak. This means permanent, independent and solid, single self. That is the view of the nema pube de wa, one of the 18 sub-schools of the Chettramawa school.

When you realize the void of that, this is the realization of emptiness in their system. This is the most gross level.

Then the other 17 schools of Chettramawa and the second main school, the do depas or Sautrantikas, and even half of the mind only schools have a different interpretation of ego, the object of negation. They call it rang gi trupei dze yul. This is some kind of self-standing substance - not a permanent, partless, independent thing any more, but still something that is a self-sufficient substance. The way they present that is very difficult and different. But let us stick with the main label first: self sufficient substance.

The Sautrantika school is not to be confused with the Svatantrika school, which is the Autonomy school, the second of the two Middle Way or Madhyamaka schools. The Sautrantikas in Tibetan are do de pa, those who mostly rely on sutras. These are Buddha's words. In Christianity there is the "Word of God", and very similar to this, the do de pas rely on what is written in the sutras. There are two or three sub-schools of do de pa. They and some of the Mind Only schools identify the ego as something substantially existent. When you realize that there is no such thing as self-sufficient substance, when you have seen the void of that then you have realized emptiness according to their system. This is still much grosser than we normally explain but much more subtle than the independent, solid, permanent self.

Now comes the Chittamatrin or Mind Only school. In Tibetan this is sem tsam pa - only mind. For them the recognition of the object of negation is dualism: sung dzin dze zhen gyi tong pa. Sung is the object whatever you perceive. dzin is the observer who is observing that object. dze is substance which makes the difference between the object and the observer. In other words, dualism, the separateness of object and observer. When you see that this is not there, then it becomes non-dual. The Mind Only school considers freedom from dualism to be emptiness. For them dualism is ego, the object of negation. Freedom from that is non-duality, which for them is emptiness. That is why they are called "mind only". There can be nothing left except the mind. Everything is sem or mind, if what is observed and the observer are non-dual.

This is a much more refined view than the view of self-sufficient essence. Right now I am only introducing the various views on the object of negation. You also have to remember that there are two kinds of emptiness: emptiness of self and emptiness of phenomena. The Chittamantrins' emptiness of duality of subject and object is referring to the emptiness of phenomena, rather than the emptiness of self. The duality and non-duality issues only come up with external objects. It doesn't rise much when you observe the self.

Now I would like to add up something here, which is very interesting. Geshe Yeshe Tapke wrote a nice commentary on these four schools. He gave me his notes, which were in terrible, hard to read hand writing. He had actually given that to somebody else to write. It was a thick file of notes. That was supposed to be the materials for his book which did later come out through the Varanasi Higher Institute of Tibetan Studies. He wrote his book as an introduction to Tsongkhapa's "Essence of Eloquence" - lek she nying po. That text of Tsongkhapa's has been translated by Thurman into English many years ago. Geshe Yeshe Takpe's introduction to this book runs into 300 odd pages.

What he gave me here as initial transcripts and what came out later as book is very different. He gave me the transcript five to seven years ago. Maybe these were his initial thoughts. I didn't think that was so impressive. But the finished work is fantastic. I just looked into it this morning. In it he has clarified a little about the non-duality and the self-sufficient entity. In addition to the non-duality he added up one more thing which Tsongkhapa had said about the view of the Mind Only school.

This is still a very basic, gross level. Then there is the Madhyamaka. This is divided into two:

uma rang gyu pa (Middle Way Autonomy school) and uma tal gyur wa (Middle Way Consequence School) . Tsongkhapa sees a big difference between these schools. Before him Tibetan teachers didn't see such a difference. Yeshe Tapke has quite clearly clarified it here.

The tal gyur wa school is so called because they use logical reasoning in a very refined way. The teacher most identified with this school is Buddhapalita.

The rang gyupa - Autonomy school says that not only the perfect faultless mind projects, but there is still something independent of that perfectly projecting mind that is self-standing. When we listen to these different definitions of the object of negation we may not really get the picture, except for the first, lowest one. To us it sounds like a lot of lot of wishy-washy language. But according to the Autonomy School this mind is free of projection by the faultless mind, but self-standing from the object's point of view. This view is recognized to be more refined than the Mind Only's view of non-duality of subject and object. So that is their object of negation and to be free of that is to realize emptiness.

Now, the last school, which Geshe Lobsang Tendzin Negi calls the Consequence School, when translating for the Loseling Khenpo. This school is considered the best. I would call them the "Reasoning School". This view is extremely subtle. Their object of negation is extremely subtle. When you realize that school's object of negation, at the same time you realize emptiness. This is extremely subtle. And for now we are just playing with words. Words are only the medium of communication. That's why a lot of Tibetan masters are saying, "We stop communicating with words and we focus on the meaning and sit." But the problem is that without first recognizing the object of negation, no matter how much you sit, it won't do you that much good, except providing you with a little good virtue, which at best will take you to a rebirth into one of the formless realms called "non-existence".

What is the Consequence school's object of negation? The word we use is "inherent existence". It is not just in independent, permanent, partless self, and not a self-sufficient substance and not a non-duality. Even non-duality means it still exists, namely in a non-dual manner.

It is not only free of projections of the mind but there is no inherent existence at all. When you know that you know the emptiness. That is why if you know the object of negation you know emptiness. Inherent existence, the most subtle object that can be negated becomes the object of negation here.

So these are the four different schools, one less gross than the other and ultimately the most refined. The schools represent these views in a historical sequence. These aspects are revealed in a historical manner. For us it is the steps we go through. It is the process we go through to recognize emptiness. Personally, I do not believe that such great teachers as Dignaga and the other earlier great Indian masters, even the great Tibetan teachers, were fools or stupid, as made out by the historical events here. They did fully know and realize emptiness, however, they presented these thoughts and ideas as their system in order for us to travel through this process easily, by going through as a historical evolution. The past events become the guidance for future works. That is how they presented the teaching.

As you have different objects of negation on gross and subtle levels, similarly, the reason which you use to challenge them, dependent arising, also has gross and subtle and refined levels.

The gross level of interdependence is the dependence on causes and results. More refined than that, the dependence on parts and parcels. More refined than that, there is the labeling and objects of labeling. Even more refined than that, interdependence is just the combination of what you label, the labeling mind and the label. So even the dependent arising has different levels of understanding. That's how we look.

This thinking has to be used when we approach the debate in the verses of the 9th chapter, between the materialists and the madhayamakas. In this case we are not talking about materialists in the sense of yuppies and hippies. We are talking about materialists as just about every view below the madhayamaka view. It is materialistic in the sense that there is some substance or material thing introduced as ego or self. The madhayamaka is non-materialistic because there is no material at all. The materialist schools include the chettamawas, do depa and sem tsampa or Mind Only school and even sometimes the rang gyupa or Autonomy school.

Keep that in mind when we are now going back to the verses 17-20.

Verse 17

[Yogacharin] If the mind itself is an illusion, then what is perceived by what?

[Madhyamika] The Protector of the World stated that the mind does not perceive the mind. Just as a sword cannot cut itself, so it is with the mind.

To paraphrase: When the person sees mind itself, if the magician him/herself is the magic, then who sees what?

This question is asked because of the Mind Only position of non-dualistic subject and object. So they are asking: if the mind itself is illusion, then who could see what? There would be nothing that can see and therefore nothing to be seen. That can't be true, so then mind has to see mind.

The Madhyamaka reply is: The Buddha said that mind does not see mind itself. This is stated in the sutra called lanka shig pai do. That is actually the ultimate sutra that the Mind Only school itself relies on. Another sutra called "Jewel" says that a sword, no matter how sharp, cannot cut itself. Likewise then, mind does not see mind.

Verse 18

[Yogacharin] It illuminates itself, as does a lamp.

[Madhyamika] A lamp does not illuminate itself, for it is not concealed by darkness.

The Mind Only debater replies to that statement: It is not true that mind does not see mind. For example, a light, such as a candle light or butter lamp, can clear [illuminate] its own nature as well as the surroundings. Both can be cleared [illuminated] by one light. Therefore likewise, self can see self. The Mind Only person thinks that if a light makes other things visible, naturally it also makes itself visible. In the same way mind should see itself, because it sees others.

The Madhyamaka reply is: It is not true that the light can clear itself. In the nature of the light there is no darkness, therefore there is nothing to be cleared [illuminated]. Light is by nature already luminous, so where is the darkness that has to be illuminated? The job of the light is to clear the darkness. Light is already light by nature, and there is no darkness to be cleared. In the same way, mind does not see mind. Therefore the example of the Mind Only school is not correct. There is no time where darkness covers the light. As the root text says: for it is not concealed by darkness.

Stephen Batchelor's translation/commentary says on this point:

The light does not illuminate itself, because something that is to be illuminated has to be first of all be un-illuminated, but as soon as the light is lit it is never obscured by any darkness.

Thubten Jinpa's translation in the Dalai Lama's commentary says:

The flame in fact can never light itself.

And why? Because the darkness never dims it.

Oh, this is much better, thanks to Thubten Jinpa. His translation is clearer than anybody else's. It is amazing. They are all saying the same thing, but the way Thubten Jinpa put it is very easy. Instead of saying: light does not clear itself he says a flame can never light itself. A flame is always in the nature of light. Once it has gone out it is not a flame anymore. But while it is a flame it is always lit. Looking from that angle, there is no darkness to be cleared, because there is no darkness. Therefore, the Mind Only assertion that mind sees mind is not correct.

Verse 19

[Yogacharin] A blue object doe not require something else for its blueness, as does a crystal. So something may or may not occur in dependence on something else.

The Tibetan in this verse is funny. Literally it says: glass blue blue itself does not depend others.

Now the Mind Only has more clarification. They hold that the mind has two aspects: seeing itself [rang rig] and seeing others. This can be understood by different examples. One example is the difference between a crystal and a lapis lazuli. A crystal, right from the beginning, is not blue, but white. But according to the base on which you place it, its color changes. A lapis lazuli, on the other hand, is blue, right from the beginning. It was blue by itself and does not depend on other factors. Likewise, they say that some part of our mind sees the self and some parts see other things. So, some part of the mind sees itself, without depending, just like a white crystal does not depend on anything to become white. However, if you put the white crystal on a blue basis, it will become blue. But a lapis lazuli does not depend on any condition. It is blue by itself.

Thubten Jinpa's translation reads:

"The blueness of a blue thing", you will say,

"Depends, unlike a crystal, on no other thing.

The blueness of a crystal depends on something else that is blue, but lapis lazuli does not. Interestingly, neither A. Wallace nor Thubten Jinpa's translation mention lapis lazuli directly. Stephen Batchelor does use lapis lazuli a little later in the discussion.

The white glass is by nature is white, not blue. If you put it on a blue base, it will appear blue. This is because of causes and conditions. To be blue there is dependence on something else. But lapis lazuli is already blue by itself. Therefore it is non-dependent. That is the Mind Only position. With that they try to prove that there are two kinds of mind: mind that sees itself and mind that sees others, like lapis and crystal.

Verse 20

[Madhyamika] As in the case of non-blueness, blue is not regarded as its own cause. What blue by itself could make itself blue?

The Madyamakas say this is not correct. Lapis lazuli, before it becomes lapis lazuli is not blue either. Only when it becomes lapis lazuli does it become blue. That is because of conditions. It is dependent on other materials. Therefore self-seeing mind cannot be established by using this example. The better example is that of light that does not need to illuminate itself because it is already in the nature of light.

The whole point of this debate is about whether the self is self-sufficient or whether it is dependent arising. Some schools say it is self-sufficient, just like the lapis lazuli is blue right from the beginning. The crystal may appear blue, but by itself it is white.

(after the lunch break…….)

I have now been given a Tibetan script version of the Bodhisattvacharyavatara. In English you have it easy. The translators put notes as to who says what. They tell you that now the Yogacharin talks and now the Madhyamaka. In Tibetan there is nothing. You have no idea of who is saying what. The text goes right through. The translators have done you a big favor. Some translations say Yogacharin, some say Chittamatrin, some say Mind Only school. But it is the same thing. In Tibetan it is sem tsam pa.

Oh, there is a new person here whom I have not seen before the break. Where does this new head come from?

Audience: From the neck.

Rimpoche: That's right, from the neck. That is a historical reference. At one time Chandrakirti had come to debate a famous non-Buddhist teacher who had conquered already the Buddhist university and was controlling everybody. Every monk was counted every day by touching them with a stick on the head, several times a day, even when they came back from the toilet. So, suddenly, one day they discovered that new person, by touching their heads and counting. So that non-Buddhist debator asked in public, "Where does this new head come from that was not there before?" and Chandrakirti replied, "From the neck." So the non-Buddhist debator knew that he had come to challenge him.

In any case, let us stick to one term: Mind Only. It is English and very easy and the direct the translation of sem tsam pa.

Verse 21

[Yogacharin] It is said that a lamp illuminates once this is cognized with awareness. The mind is said to illuminate once this is cognized with what?

Verse 22

[Madyamika] If no one perceives whether the mind is luminous or not, then there is no point in discussing it, like the beauty of a barren woman's daughter.

The Mind Only school holds that there is no separation between observer and what is observed. They say it is non-dual. The Madhayamaka's answer to that is: So who can say whether the mind is luminous or not? When there is no base there is no quality. This is because there is no separation. It would be the same as talking about the beauty of a barren woman's daughter. Barren women cannot have children, they can't give birth. So the daughter of a barren woman does not exist and it is pointless to argue whether she is beautiful or not. That cannot be checked or confirmed, because there is no barren woman's daughter in the first place.

Verse 23

[Yogacharin] If self-cognizing awareness does not exist, how is consciousness recalled?

[Madyamika] Recollection comes from its relation to something else that was experienced, like a rat's poison.

Now this is still about self-seeing. The Mind Only person is saying to the Madyamaka: you try to refute self-seeing, but that is not right. If you don't have self-seeing, how can you remember?

There are different versions even of the Tibetan root text. One says: if there is no self-seeing, how does mind remember? The quoted text in the commentary says: if the earlier mind has no self-illuminance, how can mind remember? So that goes three ways.

Tubten Jinpa's translation says:

"But if" you ask "the mind is not self knowing",

how does it remember what it knew?

If the earlier mind does not know the self, how in future can you remember? That is the question of the Mind Only. In order to remember something you have to have known it before. If you don't know it before, how can you remember it later?

The reply of the Madhayamaka is: mind never experiences self, however, mind does experience other [phenomena]. Because of that connection, you will remember.

For example, if earlier in winter, a bear was bitten by a rat, the bear won't notice, it won't affect the bear, until in spring, the thundering starts and the bear wakes up from hibernation. The effect of the rat bite will then be noticed. So it is not the experience of oneself, but the experience of something else that triggers the memory. When the thundering starts the rat bite starts to affect the bear. The bear at that time realizes, "Oh yeah, the poison got in at that time [during the winter time]." So therefore, without seeing oneself, but by seeing something else, in this case the rat bite, with that connection you remember. There does not have to be self-seeing. Normally we think, the bear remembers because he had the original experience of being bitten. However, at that time the bear was asleep. He didn't even know he was bitten. But on waking up the bear will know that it has happened at that time. Recognition can happen in this way. Remembering without even experiencing, through connection with something else can trigger memory.

Why are we talking about this? Because the argument was: if mind doesn't see mind, how can it remember later? So through the example of the hibernating bear the Madhyamaka proves that even though there was no experience of being bitten, the bear can still remember later.

These are funny, old arguments. We have the choice of either going very slowly through this text and working through the whole argument or else read very quickly and just get the chapter done.

Verse 24

[Yogacharin] It illuminates itself, because the mind endowed with other conditions perceives.

[Madyamika] A jar seen due to the application of a magical ointment is not the ointment itself.

The Mind Only person now says: All right, I cannot use self-seeing as the reason, but I have other arguments. For example, by meditating, through the condition of the meditation, one will be able to see clearly something which is very far away. You can see distance, because mind becomes closer to the object.

Tubten Jinpa's translation says:

"In certain cases" you will say "the mind can see the minds of others,

how then not itself?"

The Madhyamaka reply is: That is not necessarily so. For example, through the help of certain materials you can see things that are distant, but that does not necessarily mean the substances are self seen by the substance.

Tubten Jinpa's translation:

But through the application of a magic balm the eye may see the treasure,

but the salve it does not see.

You can see that the Madhyamaka is trying to block every example for self-seeing the Mind Only person tries to put forward. The Mind Only person says, "If there is no self seeing, then you can't see others either."

Verse 25

The manner in which something is seen, heard, or cognized is not what is refuted here, but the conceptualization of its true existence, which is the cause of suffering, is rejected here.

The Madhyamaka replies further: Seeing forms, hearing sounds, etc, are not the objects of negation here. This is because they are reality. We are not trying to negate that. The cause of the suffering, etc, is actually seeing forms and so on as truly existing and that is the only object of negation here. In other words, what you see or hear or what you don't see, and so on is not the problem.

It looks like the Madhyamaka is now trying to close that debate. The argument has been running back and forth with similar examples, so now the Madhyamaka says, "Well, what you see or don't see is not our object of negation anyway. The purpose of finding the object of negation is to eliminate suffering and in order to do that we have to find the cause of suffering. The cause of suffering is the ego. That is the one that sees everything as truly existing and that is our object of negation.

Seeing form as truly existent is the object of negation. Mind can refute that. But mind seeing form as existing cannot be refuted. Form as truly existent is refutable. Form existing as form cannot be refuted, because that is reality. So when you say, "There is no nose", you cannot just negate the whole nose, but you can negate the true existence of the nose. That is the cause of suffering and the object of negation. The existence of nose as nose is not the object of negation. The existence of the nose is not the cause of suffering, it is not ego-grasping. It is simply seeing the nose is there.

To see the nose as truly existing is the ego's way of grasping and therefore this is the object of negation. Mere existence is not the object of negation.

You have to know that when you read the Heart Sutra: no eye, no ear, no nose, no tongue..etc. Grasping form as truly existent is something that we can refute. Grasping form alone is not to be refuted. This leads to a very important question. We have all these ideas of self grasping, ego grasping, grasping at true existence. In Tibetan there are two terms: den dzin and dag dzin. Truth-grasping and self-grasping at self. You can also say holding instead of grasping. Do these terms refer to the same thing? These are the things we have to think about. We will always say that the object of negation is nothing but self grasping or ego grasping or true-holding. But what does that mean to us? This is a big issue that we have to think about for years. What do we grasp at? What is the self?

We always have self grasping within us. Is that the object of negation? What is the difference between self grasping and true-grasping? What does it mean to say: grasping at true existence of the self? It is easy to say that the Mind Only view is wrong and the Madhyamaka is right. But we are not there yet. This is a big issue. Maybe we should just draw a little attention to that and then continue reading. It is also important to go down in the text.

Verse 26

If you fancy that an illusion is neither different from the mind nor non-different, then if it is a really existing thing, how can it not be different? If it is not different, then it does not really exist.

[This is a further reply of the Madhyamaka.]

The Mind Only are talking about the mind as the observer. What does it observe? Nothing other than illusion or magic.

Tubten Jinpa's translation:

"Illusions are not other than the mind", you say. And yet you also claim that they are not the same. But must they not be different if the mind is real? And how can mind be real if there is no difference?

Mind Only says that the observed objects are nothing but illusion and at the same time they claim that these are neither separate nor one-ness. Therefore they claim that the objections by the Madhyamakas don't affect their position.

The Madhyamaka answer is: the thing that the mind observes, does that exist or not? If it is not existent, then you lose the point that it is not other than mind. If it does exist, then it has to be the nature of the mind itself, according to you. But if you still insist that it is neither this nor that, then you will lose all existence completely. You either exist or you don't. You can't be in the middle or neither existence nor not existing.

Verse 27

Just as an illusion can be seen though it does not truly exist so it is with the observer, the mind.

[Yogacharin] The cycle of existence has its basis in reality or else it would be like space.

Tubten Jinpa:

"A mirage may be known" you say, "though lacking true existence."

The knower is the same: it knows but is a mirage.

"But what supports samsara must be real", you say,

"or else samsara is like empty space."

The Mind Only says that samsara would be like empty space if there is no basis. So they say if there is no basis to the mirage or illusion, then it does not exist at all.

We often say that samsara is like a mirage. What is samsara? It is the projection of a mirage, without reality, without truth. It is a false perception. It is nothing but confusion. The Mind Only now says: if the basis of the confusion does not exist, how can there even be confusion?

The idea behind this exchange is that the observer does not exist truly. If the observer does not exist truly, how can you observe things? How can a non-existent observer mind perceive confusion and observe samsara? Remember the object of negation in the Mind Only school is duality. Non-duality for them is emptiness. It is the non-duality of observer and observed. If the observer is not truly existent how can you observe anything? If the observer is not truly existent, then the observed object, samsara - or even nirvana, does not exist, according to that view.

In other words, if there is no base for the confusion, then the appearance of confusion, samsara, also does not exist.

If the dualistic perception of samsara is empty of both points and truth, then there is no basis and it should be like space and nothing exists.

Alan Wallace uses "observer" as term for the mind. Tubten Jinpa uses "knower".

Stephen Batchelor says:

(Chittamatrin) Cyclic existence, (the state in which subject and object appear as two substantially distinct things) has as the basis of its deceptive appearance something real, namely a truly existent, non-dual consciousness. Otherwise, if it did not have something real as its basis, it would be just like space and would not (be a state which) could appear as real subjects and objects.

Batchelor intersperses a lot of commentary there, but it becomes quite clear that for the Mind Only non-duality is emptiness. The Madhyamakas don't accept that as emptiness. To the Mind Only anything that is not non-dual becomes an object of negation. Therefore, according to them, if the mind is no basis of existence then samsara will become nothing more than space. According to them, it seems that space has no base. You could definitely argue that in fact, space has a base of existence.

Maybe we should stop reading here.

I would like to share some of Yeshe Takpe's points in his new book. These points don't come up in usual teachings very often. He points out that the Buddha's teachings have to be known as belonging to two categories: one category is straight forward. You can take the words literally as they are. The other category is words that have to be interpreted.

There are a lot of reasons for this distinction.

Why people do have samsara? Because they don't know empty, peace and growth. Not knowing empty is because people think there is self-existence. That leads to ego-grasping and all of those [negative emotions] that make us continue in samsara's suffering. Because of that we don’t know peace. We only know suffering. Since we don't know peace we don't know development, the growing of joy within us. Buddha's job is to give this understanding through hundreds and thousands of logical ways and by the compassion of the Buddhas. People are continuing to suffer because of grasping at self and at phenomena. In order to be free from self grasping and grasping at phenomena one has to see emptiness of self and phenomena. Buddha has given a number of teachings in order for us to gain understanding of emptiness. He used a variety of different reasonings. Therefore it is necessary for us to search through the Buddha's teachings and try to find out true emptiness.

Buddha gave different teachings according to the level of understanding of the disciples at that time. Some disciples were ripened in their mind, some were not. Therefore Buddha made differing statements. Sometimes he gave quite extreme statements. We cannot accept those statements literally, as the words themselves have expressed it. Even in the area of emptiness alone, Buddha set forth different types of emptiness. There are gross and subtle levels, many of them. They have been given by Buddha himself. Some teachings can be accepted as straight forward and others that have to be interpreted.

One of the biggest confusions and difficulties is to figure out what is literal and what is interpretable. We cannot make the distinction on the basis of quotations alone. It has to be done on the basis of logical reasoning. That is why Buddha himself gave the statement,

Don't buy what I say because I said so. Check it, like you would check gold as to whether it is pure gold or not, by cutting, rubbing and burning. Finally, when you are convinced, you should buy.

How to make the interpretation has to be based on a number of things. I would like to introduce one of them. There are actually four categories, each of which has four parts:

tön pa zhi - The Four Dependencies

rig pa zhi - The Four Kinds of Logic

gung pa jen zhi

dem gong zhi

Lets talk just about the first one today:

tön pa zhi - The Four Dependencies

1. Depend on the dharma, not on the person

In other words: depend on the message, not on the messenger.

2. Depend on the meaning, don't depend on the words

3. Depend on the sutra of straight forward, confirmed statements and not on sutras of

unconfirmed statements

4. Depend on the wisdom consciousness, not on the mental consciousness

Depend on the dharma, not on the person.

This means: just don't buy it because it was said by Buddha or by another teacher, like your guru or lama. We like to accept something if our teacher said so. We don't want to accept something if another person who is not our teacher has said it. But that is not the right way to do it. You shouldn't decide on the basis of the personality but on the basis of what they actually said. You can't make judgments on the basis of the person who said something. We often do that. We will say, "So and So is a very reliable person and if he said so, then it is going to happen." We do that in politics, economics and also in the spiritual field. But we shouldn't do that. We should analyze the points of the statements and not make decisions based on who made the statement. We often do that. We ask, "Who is the author of that book?" and then we decide based on that, whether the book has reliable information. But according to the tön pa zhi that shouldn't be done. That includes ordinary persons and extraordinary persons, Bodhisattvas and even Buddhas.

Depend on the meaning, not on the words

You have to distinguish between the actual message and the medium of expression. The medium of expression could be made of wonderful words, smooth and expressive, but the meaning could be not so straight forward. We normally do that.

Depend on the straight forward sutras, not on the interpretable sutras

This is a little more complicated. The Mind Only for example assert a Mind Basis of All (kun zhi). They do not accept duality, they don't accept an independent self, they don't accept a self-standing self. Yet, they do accept a basis of all. There are sutras that do explain such a basis of all, but according to the Madhyamaka these are interpretable sutras. You can't just simply read it as it is.

There is one famous example, why you can't accept all words of the Buddha literally.

There was a king in Buddha's time. Buddha was always dealing with all kinds of kings. In that kingdom the prince, the son of the king, was fighting to get the power and he overthrew his own father and became king himself. The father happened to be a disciple of Buddha. He ended up in prison. The son was hoping that the father would die in prison. He limited the food and conditions hoping he would die and he didn't have to kill him in order to maintain power. But the old king did not die. On the contrary, he became very strong and healthy. That is because he obtained the level of an arya. He always looked through the prison window towards Buddha's ashram and meditated. Through that he became quite healthy. When the son came to know that he had the window bricked up. But the king begged somebody to have a little mirror put on a pillar in his cell and leave a little hole in the bricked up window, so that he could still see the ashram's reflection in his mirror and thus he continued his meditation. Then suddenly, the new king's little son got sick with a certain disease. The treatment included sucking out the wound. The new king's mother told the new king, "Now you have to suck this." The king said, "Why? I am the king." His mother told him, "When you were sick as a child, your father did that for you." So he paused and said, "Did he really do that? I thought he was always against me and hated me." The mother said, "Yes." By that time the old king was near death. Buddha had literally appeared to him in the prison and given him the final teaching and told him, "Now you are going to die." The new king suddenly decided to release his old father and all the ministers, who liked the old king, were rushing there to get him out. When the old king heard the approaching foot steps, he thought, "Now they are coming to kill me" and with that fear he died. When they opened the door, they found that the king had just died.

The new king now experienced tremendous sadness and eventually went to see Buddha. He realized that he had accumulated three of the five limitless negativities. He had killed his own father, he had killed an arya, an extraordinary person and he had killed an arhat. When he confessed all that to Buddha, Buddha gave this statement:

Father and Mother should be killed.

The wise king will destroy all his retinue and country men.

Then he will be purely liberated.

This is an interpretable statement. It cannot be accepted straightforwardly. These are the reasons why some of Buddha's statements need to be interpreted. It is not right to kill father and mother. But in this case Buddha means the father ignorance and the mother attachment. The retinue and countrymen are the activities coming out of ego and these should be destroyed. If one does that one will be liberated. Ego and its efforts are destroyed.

So you cannot just look at the literal reading of the words and say, "Buddha said so, therefore I am going to do it." You have to interpret Buddha's words and not rely on the interpretable words, but only on the non-interpretable words of Buddha.

The question now rises: Which sutra is interpretable and which is non-interpretable? It is like the constitution. It is constantly being interpreted. The whole judiciary and legislature is constantly doing that. Just like that, in the spiritual field also, one has to do that.

Depend on wisdom consciousness, not on mental consciousness

That is the statement:

The eyes are not reliable, the ears are not reliable, the nose is not reliable, the tongue is not reliable, the body is not reliable, the mind is not reliable. If they were, what is the use of the aryas' accomplishments?

Therefore we cannot depend on the ordinary perception, but have to depend on the wisdom consciousness.

Bascially, these are the Four Dependencies. These have to be established when you look into wisdom, so that you know, how to depend on the words of the different sutras and commentaries. I wanted to share that with you.

Next are the rigpa zhi - The Four Kinds of Logic

1. tö ruk kyi rig pa

2. cha gye kyi rig pa

3. ten dzin kyi rig pa

4. chu nyi kyi rig pa

These are difficult and I am not going to touch on them today. But please remember the tön pa zhi, the Four Dependencies.

We are still an hour ahead of schedule. We could have questions, but I am thinking it is enough. If we went into questions, we would be dealing with a lot of confused statements, so better not go there. Lets conclude with the protector prayers and the lam rim dedication.

Thank you very much

© 2006, Gelek Rimpoche, All Rights Reserved