63 Reification Is the Root of All Mental Afflictions

B. Alan Wallace, 04 May 2016

Alan says we will return to vipashyana territory, based on the current theme of the Panchen Rinpoche’s text on emptiness. Alan describes two technical terms central to Prasangika Madhyamika – the basis of designation (or imputation) and the designated (or imputed) object. He illustrates how each and any of our senses or mental activity can provide valid bases of designation (e.g. the body parts of someone), but that does not mean the designated object (e.g. a person named such and such) exists in the manner imputed. The foundational vipashyana practice of ‘in the seeing let there be just the seen’ is important to understanding that on the basis of the appearances we designate, impute or project upon the self or phenomena what wasn’t there already e.g. imputing permanence or something as a source of happiness. Alan frontloads the guided meditation first with a clarification on the difference in the practice of settling body, speech and mind for which the culmination is just coming to rest with no object, compared to the shamatha practice of settling the mind in its natural state, in which we attend to one of the six domains of experience (the mental domain) and then we take that all the way to the substrate. The forthcoming practice is to settle body, speech and mind and then taking the mind as the path, including the appearances arising and subjective impulses such as emotions. Alan says the practice will be to use the sharp knife of discerning intelligence so that whenever a sense of “I” arises relative to appearances or subjective impulses in the mind, see if you can identify the basis of designation and the self that is designated upon that. Doing only this is not delusional, but then the deeply ingrained tendency is to reify that which we designated. This really strikes home when we make judgements about other people as in Alan’s amusing example from today’s news of the likely Republican Presidential candidate. The reification that we do is not just an abstract activity – it is the root of all 84,000 primary and secondary mental afflictions. All afflictions are launched and have power via the delusion of reification. The meditation practice is to shine a bright light on how we impute and reify self and phenomena. Following meditation practice Alan relates the story of Milarepa and the 5 demons. We then resume the transmission and discussion of the Panchen Rinpoche’s text.

Meditation starts at 21:00


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Transcript

Olaso

So we return to vipashyana territory today and there’s going to be a theme that runs throughout the rest of Panchen Rinpoche’s discussion of emptiness, both the emptiness of individuals, of persons, and of all other kinds of phenomena, and that’s the distinction between the basis of designation – ‘basis’ is a technical term, and we’ll learn them and then they’re useful. It’s like giving you a tool like a fork or a knife. And you know exactly what it means and then you can use it, and these are very useful tools. And so, basis of designation, and designated object. Sometimes called basis of imputation, imputed object; fine, either one is fine.

[00:49] And the central theme that runs through this prasangika, this prasangika madhyamika, articulated by Panchen Rinpoche and many many others, is that these two for any given entities are never the same, they’re never identical, never identical. So, for example, I can look over at Mary Kay and I see, I see the front side of her body actually I see a little bit of body, mostly clothing, er, and the clothing is not Mary Kay and the face is not Mary Kay, but I say Oh Marie Kay’s right there. Right. And I can describe her, oh she’s fairly tall and so forth. What I’m looking at, that is the basis of designation there, is, one could say her body, a bit more precisely the front side of her body, a bit more precisely the visual appearance of the front side of her body, ok? But none of those three are a person. Certainly not Marie Kay or anybody else. A visual appearance which is arising in the space of my mind is not a person. The front side of her body isn’t even a body, and even her body isn’t a person. But, I can say is Marie Kay, is she in the room right now? And with total certainty I can say yes, she’s right there. And so on the basis of that, on that basis of designation then I designate a person, Marie Kay, right? But they’re not identical. They’re not identical.

[02.12] Now, I could be walking round the corner and hear Marie Kay’s voice and she could be speaking with someone, and recognising the voice say, ‘Oh Marie Kay’s right around the corner.’ Michelle might say ‘You know if Marie Kay’s around?’ I say ‘Oh yeah, I know. She’s right around the corner. I heard her speak.’ Well, I didn’t even see her but her voice is distinctive enough that on the basis of her voice I impute an agent who is speaking, and on that basis then I impute a person, but her voice is not a person. Right?

[02:41] Now, if Marie Kay had a dog, dogs have a very good sense of smell, of course, and they will recognise many many things by the scent, through the scent; the scent of this person, that person, and they’re very good at it. So if Marie Kay were coming home and her dog is eagerly waiting for her, he might, he or she might first pick up the scent and then think, in dog language: Oh! Marie Kay’s home. [laughter] On the basis of scent. You know, scent. And so, you can see, if, if Marie Kay and I were exploring a tunnel together and then, I’m not quite where, sure, and I reach out and I touch her shoulder, Oh! You’re there. Good. I thought maybe I’d lost you. You know? And so on the basis of tactile sensation, or that, or firmness, the earth element, say: Oh, there you are! And she says: yeah, there I am. Yeah, I’m here. [sound of tapping] And she taps me back on the shoulder, right?. And so none of these things are a person, but each of those is legitimate. These are valid bases of designation. Touch, scent, sight, sound, and so forth. And then Marie Kay may be sitting quietly and observing her own mind and she might in the course of her meditation, which we’re going to soon begin, erm, she might just quite naturally and accurately think: I’m getting a bit bored, or a bit agitated, or my mind is wandering, I’m, I’m getting distracted, I’m really enjoying this, I’m having so many memories, and so on and so on. And in each of those cases where the word “I” is coming up you can examine: is the I that is designated 'I', Marie Kay, is that identical to, or different from, that upon which that sense of I is imputed or designated?

(04:30) For example, if an unpleasant feeling comes up, I feel bad, but I’m not a feeling. I desire a bit of water, getting thirsty, but I’m not a desire. I want some water but I’m not a desire. And so forth, and so on. So, body parts, all of the five senses, any type of mental activity, are, on the basis of these we may quite legitimately, quite accurately, meaningfully, say: I, I, I. Right? And yet, in none of those cases is the basis of designation actually a person. Now that’s true for everything else, which is quite remarkable.

(05:12) So we’re, I’m going to wrap this up because we want to get back to meditation, back to the text. But remember in the early phases, kind of like I think the first week or two, ah, in the seen let there be just the seen, in the heard just the heard, that thing that I think we’re all very very familiar with that, and that very basic kind a kind of foundational vipashyana, so crucial, and very much in tune with the Sautrantrika view, and very much in tune with the foundational teachings and the four close applications of mindfulness – you recall?-- that bringing out that razor very practically, very, you know, very down home, where we live, and distinguishing what’s reality dishing up? What’s simply being presented in the seen, there being just the seen, and so forth, the tactile, the auditory, the mental, and then what’s being projected upon that? You know. Such as imputing more permanence than is in fact there. Imputing, or projecting, some sense of this, this makes me happy, this landscape makes me very happy. Well that means to me just any time I open my eyes I’ll just have happiness coming up every time, if it’s a source of happiness, right? So, imputing sources of happiness, of sukha, upon appearance, that’s a projection. And of course, I and mine, the three marks of existence. And so we did that before, really really useful, very very practical in dealing with life. And now we’re in that same continuum. We’re just taking it from the, let’s say, Pali canon to the Prajñaparamita, to Madhyamika, so we have these so-called bases of imputations arise, and then upon them we designate, we impute, or we project, that which wasn’t there already, but we do so and then what happens, and that’s perfectly fine, just very casually, with no reification. Err, Brendan may ask: is Marie Kay around? Have you seen her? Oh yes. She’s right over there. That’s not a delusional question or a delusional answer. At all. There’s no problem there at all, right? Two Arya bodhisattvas could have that conversation. She’d still be over there. Right? It’s fine. As long as we know what’s going on. There’s one statement from the sutras where the, I think it’s the Tathagata, the Buddha is referred to as saying the Tathagata uses words but is not fooled by them. Something to that effect. Very close. So, is Marie Kay there? Yes, she’s right over there. Yeah. But knowing how light, how feathery, how non-substantial that is, not conflating the Mary Kay with that upon which I’m imputing her, which is never Marie Kay.

[07:50] So I’d like to bring this down home to our own practice, but it’s helpful to have something there, very tangible, there’s a person, and none of us seriously doubts that she’s here, so that’s good. And then the question is ontology, and that is in what manner is she here? She appears to be existing from her own side. And that, that’s a way of existing. She really is there from her own side, and she, this individual, is displaying her properties: of her body, her form, her voice, her scent, and so forth and so on, but she’s really there from her own side. That would be a way, a mode, of existence. That’s how she is. She’s really there, and she bears her own attributes. And I’m here as a metaphysical realist mapping what is the nature of the true Mary Kay who’s already there. Let me write her biography. Let me take many photos. Let me get a very thorough account so I can re-present, represent, re-present the Mary Kay that’s already there, right? That’s metaphysical realism, right? Most of science but, as we’ve seen, not all of science, is exactly after that. There’s a universe out there. It already happened. It started thirteen point eight billion years ago, or seven thousand years ago, whichever story you like, but it was already out there and now the scientist comes in and says: well let’s find out what’s really out there and we’ll develop our theories and get better and better, more and more complete, more and more accurate and precise maps that re-present what’s already out there, knowing that finally, if we ever complete this process, there will be one true map that accurately re-presents the one true reality that’s absolutely out there. Including big asteroids. Right? That’s metaphysical realism. Most of science is fueled by that, very understandably. It’s not stupid. It’s really not stupid at all. The Theravada interpretation of the Pali canon, by and large, it’s saturated by metaphysical realism. It’s not stupid at all. It may be mistaken but it’s not foolish. It’s not foolish. And it takes a razor-sharp sword of vipashyana, of prajña, of the Perfection of Wisdom of Nagarjuna, and so forth, to cut through these appearances. Or, and that’s one way of doing it. Or the other way is get four hundred years of physics under your belt and see where quantum mechanics and quantum cosmology takes you. And lo and behold it really does look like there’s a profound convergence there.

[10:16] So, how to relate this to the practice, and we’ll give a guided meditation, but I’d like to frontload it so I don’t need to overburden you with my interventions into the practice. And what I’d like to do here, of course, is settle body, speech and mind, ground a bit, and then turn to the shamatha practice of taking the mind as a path, or the shamatha practice of settling the mind in its natural state. Ok? That’s different than simply the culmination of simply settling body speech and mind in their natural state. I never really clarified that but I should right now, really briefly. That culmination of settling body speech and mind is simply coming to rest with no object; ready to go but just resting in stillness, and then ready to do whatever you want to do. Or just stay there, as you like. That’s the culmination of settling body speech and mind. And then there’s the shamatha practice of settling body speech – [snaps fingers] settling the mind in its natural state. And that’s where you ARE attending to one of the six domains of experience: the space of the mind and whatever arises in it. And then you take that all the way to the substrate. Ok? So, it’s the same term, semnyi bhavana[11:23 sp?], settling the mind in its natural state. One is simply a culmination of the preliminary, a preparatory practice, and the other one is for the long haul; weeks, months or years, until your mind has settled in its natural state. And what that means is it’s melted, become deconfigured, and your coarse mind has dissolved into subtle mind and all you’re left with is the substrate consciousness aware of the substrate and, reflexively, of itself. So, I didn’t clarify that before, and it’s very easy to confuse; same term, but used for different things that are related but not identical. Ok?

[11:57] So what I’d like to do now, in coming back to the forthcoming meditation, is, having settled body speech and mind, then take the mind onto the path, as usual, focusing on the space of the mind, whatever arises within it, and knowing full well that will include appearances arising to the mind. The soundtrack is very common, imagery, something comparable to visual imagery is very common. So appearances will arise, images, but of course there will also be the subjective impulses: desires, feelings, thoughts, and so forth; the thinking process, and so forth; emotions, and so on. And so as those are arising we’re not going to just settle with shamatha because we’re now into vipashyana territory. But the shamatha is the basis for, the shamatha is the basis for vipashyana. The stronger the shamatha is, the stronger your vipashyana can be. If your shamatha is weak your vipashyana will never be strong. That’s just the way it is. As Karma Chagme Rinpoche just said what is true. And so as we’re resting in shamatha then we bring out that discerning intelligence, that mode of inquiry, and I invite you here then to ask, whenever there arises a sense of self, of I, anything, a memory of your own appearance may come up. Oh, I’m putting on a bit of weight. Like that. Just for example. I am getting a bit chubby. I’m. I’m. We get I am. Okay. I’m imputing myself on a mental image of my body which has probably ten to twenty pounds more than I really need. Right? So I am getting chubby, right? Or, I am getting old. Blah, blah, blah. You know, like that, based on an appearance. Or, when may have a recollection of one’s voice, other appearances, and when they impute one’s self upon the basis of appearances arising in the space of the mind. Very easy to do, especially when memories come up. Oh, then I was feeling so happy; or, oh I really like that person so much; and oh, oh, oh. I, I, I. Imputed upon appearances arising in the mind. The appearances are not you. They’re the basis of designation of you, they’re not you. Right? But then also, up close and very very personal, are the subjective impulses that come up: the desires, the feelings, the thinking process, the think, I think therefore I am; I am the thinker, I’m thinking this, and imputing myself upon this, ah, and so forth. So see if you can discern. This takes a sharp knife. As the sense of I arises relative to some appearances arising in the mind, or the sense of I arises relative to some subjective impulse in the mind, see if you can identify what’s the basis of imputation, or the basis of designation, and the self that is designated upon that. Just doing that is not delusional, any more than if I say, you know, yes, like, yes, there’s Mary Kay or, I’m speaking. That’s not delusional at all. Of course, it’s true. We designate, then the tendency, the overwhelmingly deeply ingrained tendency, is to reify that which we have designated. So we designate and then stand off, like: who, me? I didn’t do that. As if now we’re passive, it’s that, that’s already Mary Kay. Mary Kay is, you know, blah blah blah. That we impute that designated object and then, not even noting that we did it, we just see it as out there, as if our awareness of it is completely passive; as if this is not a participatory event but a purely witnessing event, right? Now, this, this really, really strikes home, ah, when we have judgements for example about other people.

[15:58] If I can just make a brief foray here, I’ll try to be very polite, but it looks like Donald Trump is going to be the nominee for the Republican Party to become Commander-in-Chief. [laughter] And so I saw a photo of him and I had a very strong designation come up. [loud laughter] Really really strong! Like, I’m just witnessing that this person is such and such; that he has certain qualities. This is an expression of such and such. And if all seven billion human beings were all looking they would all agree with me. If God exists, God would agree with me. If all the thousand Buddhas of this fortunate kalpa looked, they would agree, yes Alan, you got it right. [laughter] It feels that way. [laughter] And if anybody disagrees, I’m sorry, you’re delusional. I got this one right. [Alan laughs] Absolutely got this one right! You know? As if I’m simply witnessing, you know? And there is no process of designation. That this person is inherently – and I’m not going to put him down. He doesn’t need that from me. You don’t need that from me. But just that this person is inherently, and then you put fill the adjective, whatever feels suitable, you know. [chuckling] But it won’t be the same. His wife, his daughter, his friends, and so forth. His supporters. It looks like a majority of Republicans want to have him as president. That’s a lot of people. So far, anyway. Erm, but toward that, and I’m taking a kind of an obvious example you know, he’s a big media person right now. That too will pass. But if all the time that we’re making these evaluations that we feel are not evaluations. No, that wasn’t my evaluation, I just observed that. You know. And it’s for people, it’s for situations, it’s places, things, all kinds of things. That’s not my evaluation. That’s not my opinion. That’s what I observed. That’s what I observe. And that’s where the reification comes in. It already was as I apprehended it, and my role here is simply the passive witness. That’s delusional.

[18:15] And then, of course, we can get fierce disagreements. I mean, there have been clashes. There have been these, you know, there’s been some real, you know, some violence in the demonstrations, for and against Mr Trump. And each side is persuaded that they’re perceiving this man in the correct way. And that the other hand it is simply delusional, and they should be, they should be silenced. They should be suppressed. They shouldn’t be able to do this. These people are, they got it wrong! You know. And therefore they shouldn’t have a vote. They should be, they should be swept to the side. We should drown them out. We shouldn’t let them speak because they’re wrong, because we know our perspective is right. Well how long has that been going on? You know? And so then, I mean so far it’s just been a skirmish here and there, but when we consider world wars throughout all of history it’s always come down to that. We have the right perspective, and if you differ from us you’re wrong. So, we’ll have to suppress you, kill you, silence you, overwhelm you, like that.

[19:16] So when it says that this reification, it sounds like this kind of this esoteric abstract philosophical term that could only be of interest to people who’re concerned with metaphysical realism, but it turns out reification is at the root of all mental afflictions: craving, hostility, the whole, the whole shebang. It’s said in the Madhyamika that any mental affliction that arises, of any of the eighty-four thousand kinds, or all the different lists that Buddhas have of primary and secondary mental afflictions, they all, for them to launch and have power they are all rooted in delusion. And it’s the delusion of reification; the delusion of dualistic grasping. So the stakes here are actually very very high. This is absolutely not a matter simply of interest to philosophers. Or if it is, it’s really a shame, because this is really core; to the suffering that we experience, from day to day, as individuals, communities, nations, and so forth and so on. So, to shine a bright light on the nature of the delusional process itself, to see how we do impute a designated object upon a basis of designation; that we are participants in this reality, filled with objects of our own making, how we impute, and then how we reify, and on the basis of reification then very easily feel hostility for this group and attachment for this group, attachment for my side, aversion to the other side, then we see Oh! This is a high stakes game. This is significant. Ok? O Olaso.

(20:52) So that was a lot of frontload. Hopefully now I can use very few words and just like throwing darts at a dart board, just be very concise. So please find a comfortable position to go in.

(21:07) chime for start of meditation

Settle the body speech and mind in a state of dynamic balance and equilibrium so that they are serviceable for meaningful endeavours such as the practice of vipashyana.

(24:12) Then from that relative stillness, let your eyes be gently open, your gaze resting vacantly in the space in front of you, and single-pointedly focus your attention on the space of the mind, one of six domains of experience. Selectively focus on this one, and on any or whatever mental events in terms of both objective experiences and subjective impulses that arise and are perceived within this domain. Rest in stillness observe movement.

(26:19) And now we introduce into this shamatha practice the spirit of inquiry, keeping on the alert now for the arising of the sense of I, relative to any appearances that might arise in the mind that trigger the sense of I. This could pertain to you in the past or in the future, or in the present, but also the subjective impulses that arise from moment to moment: Oh I’m practising well; Oh I’m getting so distracted; I’m feeling a bit tense, and so on and so on. As soon as you see that you’ve designated the sense of I, or I am, which is something projected, imputed, designated, see with the razor-sharp blade of your intelligence if you can distinguish between the I that you have designated and the basis on which you’ve designated it, from moment to moment. And note, also, the range, the variety, of bases of designation upon which you may impute yourself. It’s not always the same. Examine closely.

(33:12) When you can clearly see for yourself that you have projected the designated object, in this case yourself, upon the varying bases of designation, but the designated object wasn’t already there, you didn’t discover it, you projected it, imputed it. When you see that clearly, that you have added something to reality from your own side, then it immediately follows that whatever that basis of designation was, in terms of its own nature, is empty of that which you have designated upon it. The designated object is nowhere to be found, objectively, within the basis of designation because it wasn’t there in the first place. So realise the emptiness of the bases of designation; empty of the objects that are designated upon them. The designated objects do not exist from the side of the basis of designation. Is it true or not? Examine closely. And if at times you become a bit fatigued, this is certainly challenging, then slip back, rest your mind, rest in the stillness of your awareness and simply observe the thoughts and other events arising, and passing, like a shepherd observing his flock out on the open plain. When you’re rested you may return to the practice of vipashyana. Let’s continue practicing now in silence.

(45:14 meditation ending chimes)

(45:33) Olaso. So I’d like to make a brief interlude before returning to the text to begin providing glue, that is my intention, to really merge together, integrate, the practice that we’re doing here on a daily basis and these rather advanced teachings for very deep vipashyana practice. And for that I wanted to return to the story that, I have this in my memory, it’s kind of vague because, if I remember correctly, the last time I heard this story was when Geshe Ngawang Dhargyey told it, the story of Milarepa and the demons. And I think he was the only one I heard it from and if so, I heard it about forty-four years ago so, you know, memory is a bit wobbly. Ahm, found it in the Lamrim in the end, in the book, his book, “The Tibetan Tradition of Mental Development”, those are my class notes, they were edited so, they’ll be there. If it’s in there it’ll be in that book, yeah. So, but back to the story of Milarepa, and so I checked it out, and it’s a good story, it’s even better than what I gave, but what I gave out wasn’t actually, was not incorrect, but we’ll see how this relates to our practice here, of settling the mind in its natural state and to the teachings on emptiness. It’s good to weave these together, to integrate them, yeah? So here’s the story. I found the most definitive story source I could find on the internet. The most definitive would be to go to his definitive biography, but this I think is pretty good, I think. It strikes me as authentic.

[47:07] So here’s the story: one day Milarepa returned with fire to his cave. This is not too long after Marpa, his guru, had given him the full empowerment, oral transmission, explanations, fully launched him, gave him all the teachings he needed, teachings, empowerments, and so forth, to launch him into long-term solitary retreat; basically going into retreat until you’re enlightened. So Milarepa gave him everything he needed, yeah? And so, Milarepa’s up there in his cave and of course he had obstacles. He had good days and bad days apparently, strangely. And one day, and he had a fierce storm that was quite upsetting. But one day Milarepa returned with firewood to his cave and found it invaded by five horrific demons with eyes as large as saucers. [laughter] Shocked, Milarepa politely introduced himself, [laughter] – such a gentleman – and asked them to leave. That’s very courteous. You know if people show up uninvited as guest in your home you say, well hallo, my name’s Alan, erm, would you please go? Pacifying. Pacifying, right? First, try that one. Will you please go? Maybe you came to the wrong address.

[48:27] At this, the demons became menacing, surrounding him while growling and grimacing, and laughing maliciously. They sound like street thugs. So, Milarepa was alarmed and attempted the most powerful, the powerful exorcism, recitations to no avail. Trying to get them to go. Go! Please, go. But to no avail. The demons became even more threatening, ok? So next the yogi tried with great compassion to pacify them with Buddhist teachings. So, give them some of the second mode, enrich them. Give them a Dharma talk. That’ll do it. You know? Enrich their understanding with a compassionate motivation. How about the Four Noble Truths, you know? But they still remained, more vivid and horrible than before. I guess they didn’t like his dharma talk. Finally Milarepa realised that his approach was mistaken and that he needed the most direct means possible. Having proclaimed the fearlessness which he had discovered in his practice, Milarepa followed the training given him by his guru. He invited the demons to stay with him and to receive his hospitality. So, gave up the whole notion of banishing them, said: stay. Hang out.

[49:48] Now, that’s where some versions of the story stop. They stop too soon. The story’s not finished. If we stop right there, this sounds eerily similar to, kind of, the mindfulness movement in its less intelligent manifestations. And that is, whatever comes up, don’t exercise any judgement whatsoever. Mental afflictions, wholesome, unwholesome, no judgement, just, And don’t judge yourself for heaven’s sake. And don’t question anything. Just be non-judgemental. Be accepting of whatever comes up in your mind-stream. And, be comfortable in the company of your mental afflictions. If people find that helpful I’m glad they find it helpful. That’s not Buddhism. That’s not Buddhism. That’s not even remotely Buddhism. To get comfortable with your mental afflictions? And then to go on and say this is the essence of Buddhist meditation without the Buddhism is not only false but it’s really profoundly misleading. And so it’s not that. That’s not Buddhist meditation at all, it’s more just status quo, but being more comfortable with your mental afflictions than you were before. But the notion that you’ll be free of them that way is simply absurd. So it’s really unfortunate then if one stops the story there because it seems to reinforce, well, just get friendly with your mental afflictions, they’re not that bad after all, you’re only human. What do you expect? Human beings have craving and lust and greed and jealousy, but we’re only human so just kind of be comfortable with that and, for heaven’s sake, I’ve heard this a number of times on media, don’t strive for perfection, you’ll never achieve that, that’s really wrong. Don’t strive for perfection, be real, you know? Accept your limitations. Accept your mental afflictions. Just go and get comfortable. Enjoy life. Ok? That’s ok. If people find that helpful I guess so, but that’s not even remotely Buddhism.

[51:55] But he did. He invited the demons to stay with him and receive his possibility [hospitality]. Now, here I recall, very vividly, Sam Sogye Rinpoche, he uses another metaphor for settling the mind in its natural state. Very nice. I remembered it from some years ago. He said: be the gracious host in the midst of unruly guests. Ok? I think we all understand exactly what that means. So the gracious host, of course, is the stillness of your own awareness. Not glomming onto, not fighting with, or becoming attached to, or identifying with, any of the unruly guests of whatever arises in your mind, which is all kinds of things, but being the gracious host in the midst of unruly guests just being present, being present, but without the cognitive fusion. Just being present. So it seems like, ok? he did that, right? Because he said, you know, I welcome you to stay. In other words, I’m not letting you go, I’m letting you be. In the space of my mind, these five demons with eyes as big as saucers. But he didn’t, and let me, you know, receive hospitality, so really so far this sounds like shamatha. It sounds like shamatha. I’m just going to rest in stillness, pay no, make yourself comfortable, whatever. But that’s not where the story ends. He also challenged them to a friendly contest of teachings. A bit like Geshe Ngawang Dhargye. This great big grin [hands smack together] It’s truly a friendly contest because they’re really contesting, they’re really debating. They’re definitely competing. But it’s joyful, it’s friendly, and it’s very very sharp. Razor sharp, and it’s very fast. See two accomplished meditators, Oh, they do not sit back and say, let me think about that for a while, or everybody just bursts into laughter. They burst into laughter. It’s got to be sharp, like two duelists. Pow pow pow. It just doesn’t stop. Very snappy. So here it is, we’ve seen this. He also challenged them to a friendly contest of teachings and then he addresses them: Ye ghosts and demons, enemies of the Dharma. I welcome you today. It is my pleasure to receive you. I pray you, stay. Do not hasten to leave. We will discourse and play together. Although you would be gone, stay the night. And then he says: we will pit the black against the white dharma and see who plays the best. Before you came you vowed to afflict me. Shame and disgrace would follow if you returned with this vow unfulfilled. [laughter] So, he’s inviting them to a contest. Right? Now bear in mind, before he ever met Marpa, he was an accomplished sorcerer. That’s how he was able to do his nefarious deeds, killing all those people. You have to have pretty darn good samadhi for that and he did, he was a wielder of the dark arts. I accept that literally. And so in that case, where he killed these thirty-five people who had treated his own family so badly, especially his Uncle, he was using ferocity, he was using wrath, and he used it, directing his wrath, his ferocity, his destructive ability, he used that against people. Sentient beings. And he intended to cause misery, and he did. On one occasion, and this is also a very old memory, but as I resor-[recall], as he went about it was really like, actually very sinister, because he, using his, his abilities, his dark magic – it’s not magic, though, just these dark abilities, he wiped out the crops, the material possessions of his Uncle and Aunt, who were his primary targets. And then he killed all the rest of them. That would be thirty-five people or so. He killed all their kinsmen and he left them standing; he left them unscathed. This is really very sinister. There’s no happy smile on this one. He wiped them out financially, killed off all their relatives, all their loved ones, and left these two, and his intention was: now may you live the rest of your days in bitterness and grief. And now this is how I get back at you for what you did to my family. It was sheer revenge. Very malevolent. So he took his, the power of his mind, the powers that he had acquired through this other teacher, and he directed his ferocity, his wrath, his hatred, his malevolence, and he created great misery. Right? He already, he still knew how to do that. When he started with Marpa he didn’t have amnesia. He still knew how to exercise those black arts. But now he’s under an enlightened master rather than another kind. So now these five demons were appearing and he knows, you know, he’s got a mafiosa background. He knows how to do mass murders. He knows that he has this ability. But now he’s not, but these are not five people that came in. These are five demonic apparitions coming in, right? And he’s challenging them, white against black; the dark side, the bright side, you know? So now it’s much more interesting, isn’t it? Than they all just left happily ever after, and they played house for the rest of their lives, with their mental afflictions and they all just got really cosy and watched soap operas together. [laughter] Ok. I find that kind of a boring ending.

[57:30] So he says: although you would be gone, maybe you feel a little bit, like I want you to go, stay the night. We will pit the black against the dark, we’ll pit the dark side against the white side, and see who plays the best. Before you came you vowed to afflict me, shame and disgrace would follow if you returned with this vow unfulfilled. So he was reserving the last mode of enlightened activity as the one that still could be used. He tried pacifying. He tried enriching. He tried power. And they’re still there. And clearly he does want them to leave. He wants to be in solitary retreat, not have five housemates. So the last mode of enlightened activity, ferocity, is the final resort for an accomplished yogi like Milarepa. He did this with the challenge we will pit the black against the white dharma and see who plays best. And here he is referring to the black magic and sorcery of his past training, his central shadow directly confronted by the white magic of Buddhism which can accomodate and purify the black. So this is vajrayana. You’re taking that malevolence – look at Vajramita, look at Yamantaka, look at Mahakala, look at Palden Lhamo. These are ferocious. They are ferocious. And these are said to be enlightened beings, not just some worldly deities in a bad mood. And so it’s taking that energy, which is the mental affliction of hatred, and transmuting it into something that in fact empowers you on the path to enlightenment and purifies that mental affliction along the way. Ok? It’s very high tech. Very kind of an alchemical approach. And Milarepa was thoroughly trained in that by his teacher Marpa. So he’s going to take that malevolent dark force that he had mastered earlier, which was dark and used as dark, and he’s going to use that now and transmute it under the guise and with the motivation of the dharma that he learned from Marpa, and so, he’s going to use that, he’s directly confronted by the white magic, the dark is directly confronted by the white magic of the Buddhadharma which can accomodate, and purify, transmute the dark.

[59:45] Having challenged the demons, Milarepa arose and rushed with great confidence directly at them. So this is where the story comes to an end. You can imagine he wasn’t just kind of rushing at them as a skinny little yogi. He’s going to be rushing at them in a way that’s going to terrify them. Probably Mahakala’s a pretty good guess. So Milarepa rose and rushed with great confidence directly at them and they shrank in terror, rolling their eyes and trembling violently, and then swirled together into a single vision and dissolved. With this the activity of ferocity was completed and Milarepa the black sorcerer was reclaimed by Milarepa the white sorcerer. He took that violence, that malevolence, the hostility, ferocity, transmuted it into something where in fact there was no harm, but the demons that were apparitions of his own mind were dispelled. And that’s the end of the story. I think it’s a much more interesting story.

[1:00:47] And so, interpretation, I mean I’ll just spend a bit of time on this, erm, I don’t have the right interpretation. I just look at the story and try to interpret it in the way that’s most meaningful for me. I think we’ve all heard of the five obscurations, right? which, when we’re practicing shamatha they may arise in ways that are, seem very demonic, with eyes as big as saucers. And they taunt us, they challenge us, they ridicule us, they really make our lives very difficult, right? And all of them do, don’t they? On different occasions. In different ways, of course. But demon of hedonic fixation, completely taking us away from dharma, throwing us out on the sea of samsara. This real malevolent demon of ill-will and malevolent hostility makes our lives just hell. Right? Laxity and dullness which just sends us into a stupor; excitation and anxiety never gives us any rest. No peace of mind. But I’m going to linger only on the last one, because I think it’s relevant for people here. Not only one or two, probably more than that. Afflictive uncertainty. A lot of the teachings here, no-one, certainly not I, expects anyone here listening by podcast or here in Tuscany, to simply be accepting everything I’m saying. That would be kind of missing the whole point. Oh. Alan said it, must be true. I believe. Boy, would that be missing, missing the whole point! Right? It wouldn’t even help you. Just to believe all this stuff and then go home. Hey Honey, I’ve brought home a lot more beliefs than I left home with. Good. Put them in the garage, the house is full. Put them in the garage, We’ll find more storage for them somewhere. You know, useless. So of course, when our beliefs, our assumptions, let alone the beliefs and assumptions of many hundreds of millions of people around us, including highly intelligent, very educated people, when we’re challenging their beliefs and assumptions, well, we shouldn’t do so casually. Especially, you know, many of us have been educated into those assumptions, beliefs and so forth. If we’ve had any kind of scientific education at all, but also in the humanities. When I was studying Religious Studies at Stanford University the one thing you never do is take a religious approach to Religious Studies. We studied Marx. We studied Freud. We studied materialism, deconstructions, anthropological deconstructions, sociological deconstruction, psychological deconstruction, economic deconstructions, atheistic deconstruction. We had to study all of that. You know. And then write papers on it. Of all of the ways that people completely kind of deconstruct and discredit religion. That was part of our education. And if you ever write a doctoral thesis in which you appear to be championing Buddhism in a secular university, good luck with that. You know. It’s not how it’s done. You’re supposed to take an objective stance, and if that’s completely materialistic that’s perfectly fine. But for heaven’s sake don’t take a Buddhist stance because then you’ve lost your objectivity.

[1:03.52] Ok, I won’t linger on that, but when we encounter views such as Mount Meru may actually exist, for starters, you know, and all the other ones just the notion that phenomena don’t exist from their own side, let alone Mount Meru, just that one. What?! You know. It’s only right that uncertainty arises. If it doesn’t then either we are just brilliant and see right through to the essence, or we’re just lazy. Just accepting it because someone else said so. And the Buddha expressly encouraged people not to do that: mere hearsay, my teacher said, it’s written in great sutras, or some other scripture, and so forth. And so, when uncertainty, let’s follow here, for those, anybody experience afflictive uncertainty, about anything, not just about a Buddha-dharma; about your own abilities. Your own abilities to practice and really progress, and deeply benefit from shamatha and vipashyana, the Four Immeasurables, and so forth. Can you really get benefit or are you pretty much just stuck right where you are and this is all more or less window dressing, just icing on a really nasty cake? You know? Do you have any confidence in yourself to really proceed along the path? To reach the path. To proceed along the path.

[01:05.05] Afflictive uncertainty of course arises, and for good reason, you know? We are not evidently surrounded by arya-bodhisattvas, and people, we don’t have caves, we don’t have the caves of Tuscany filled with highly accomplished yogis who’ve achieved dhyana. If there are, they’re keeping it a secret. So of course afflictive uncertainty arises. And so when you’re resting there, settling the mind in its natural state, or you’re just walking along minding your own business, and some afflictive uncertainty with eyes as big as saucers comes and starts to harass you, grimacing and growling and menacing, well you could say: would you please leave? [laughter] And maybe they will if it’s really a wimpy, mental, you know afflictive uncertainty. Oh Gosh! Well now you ask me, of course I’ll leave. Could happen. Not too likely. And so, if it persists you may try to give it a good dharma talk. Good luck with that. Or develop loving-kindness and compassion for uncertainty, really doesn’t make any sense at all. They’ll laugh at you. But to examine it closely, to acknowledge afflictive uncertainty as uncertainty, and then confront, engage, invite them to stay and have a conversation. Apply two of the jhaña factors: more general coarse investigation, subtle analysis. Cut through it. But you don’t have to drown them out, scream at them until they go, but engage them within a duel. A duel of wits; a duel of intelligence. And see who wins, right? If you win, if you win, you see the afflictive uncertainty come up, you bring your full intelligence up, and to your satisfaction, because you’re the judge of the duel, not me or somebody else. If you engage with your afflictive uncertainty and you cut it right down and say: I’ve just finished with you. Right? It can happen. I went through a lot of uncertainty I’ve had over the years. We all do. If it still comes back after it’s beaten in a fair fight, then scare the crap out of it. [laughter] I really want to have this word introduced into English because it sounds like a swear word and it’s not: BASTA! It sounds like it should be: Oh, you used one of those six-letter words. But it’s really good. Like, we’ve had our conversation, I’ve won, basta! Beat it! I’m finished. You have nothing more to say here. And if you want to manifest as Mahakala that should be just fine. You know. But only after you’ve won the debate. Or maybe it was a really good doubt and it was doubting something where your understanding was in fact flawed. In which case you welcome them in. That was very, I’m so glad I doubted that, otherwise I would just have been complacent in misunderstanding. Ok? And in the midst of all that to recognise that each of those five mental afflictions is not inherently existent. That would be very helpful. Olaso.

[1:08:20] Let’s get back to Panchen Rinpoche, time is flying by. But it’s a good story, right? We remember a good story long after we forget dharma talks, and that terminology, and sophisticated lists, and so forth and so on. We tend to remember a good story, and I think that’s a probably forty-four year old memory of mine, which actually turned out to be, doesn’t have all the details but I was happy to see, ha! Didn’t get it wrong anyway. That’s good.

[1:08:49] Ok, so now we go back to Lamp so Bright I checked the, the earlier ones where I had some qualms and Roger Jackson’s translations are actually fine. He does, as I said before, a very capable scholar, and so I just interpret, I stick with my interpretations of the preceding ones, but the translations are fine. So we consider here, we continue on now, “Also as stated in “The Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Verses” the circling of all sentient beings because of grasping at I and mine is samsara.” So they’re circling about in the cycle of ageing, sickness and death, and so forth. This is all the root cause is grasping at I and mine, ok? Familiar. The root delusion. “The ultimate root of all flaws is connate self-grasping.” Self-grasping means reification of the self. Reification of oneself. Or the connate grasping at I. So that’s exactly what we did in the last meditation: a sense of I comes up – no problem. I’m a person. I’m talking. There is Michelle, there’s Geoffrey, and so forth. But then the reification of, well, that’s a problem. “In general the mind that has the thought “I am” operates in one of three ways: one, takes the I as distinguished by being truly existent.” So one way of thinking “I am” is to reify yourself. I really am. Whatever. Yeah, I am. I’m here. I’m really, I’m really here. Inherently here. I’m absolutely here. We’re familiar with that. That’s common. But it’s not the only way that we can apprehend the self. “The second way is the mind that takes the I as not truly existent. It sees that the I that is designated, that is conceived, is not truly existent. Or takes it as a mere name, or merely imputed by thought; seeing that’s one existence is purely nominal, or merely imputed by thought, conceptually designated.” So, I remember having this one-on-one conversation with Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche [Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso] the junior tutor to the Dalai Lama. This was also about forty-two years ago, and he was discussing this, explaining it a bit to me, and he was pointing out, I don’t remember the exact details, but I do remember the gist of it, and he was saying that all phenomena are empty of inherent nature, like, we didn’t have cell phones back then, but like, you know, whatever, like your robe. The robe is yours. The robe is yours. But now, forty-four years later, the cell phone’s mine, right? But it’s mine, that’s a true statement! It’s mine. But only because we agree. Just because we say it, and we agree, they’re worth money. But if we stop saying that, then it’s not. So, it is mine, only because we’ve conceptually, I think this is mine, and other people agree, therefore it is. Or I say it’s mine, which one’s mine? Oh, it’s not that one, no it looks like, no this is mine. And that’s it. But as soon as we shift the designation that reality just evaporates. And he’s saying all phenomena are like that. And when I listened to him I thought, but everything else is different. Asteroids, you know. Planets. Dinosaurs. And they don’t stop becoming dinosaurs just by not calling them dinosaurs any more. So, he dropped, he suggested that, that in fact, like this, the my-ness of the cell phone, everything else: merely nominal. Well, for a brilliant mind, you just follow the implications and you see it, oh that’s true.

[01:13:02] Very brief example: years later, 1985 or so, I think 1985, when I was studying physics and really specifically studying the energy of the vacuum, and calculating the energy density of the vacuum, ok, it’s hard. But I’d studied enough mathematics I could do it. But I found the text that showed the equations of how do you calculate the energy density of the vacuum, of empty space. How much energy is there in a cubic centimetre of empty space? And as I recall, I think my memory’s pretty clear here. This is only thirty years ago instead of forty-two, it was four equations. Four equations. Bomp bomp. And each one you know, just a line, line and a half, bomp bomp bomp bomp, finished. I looked at that and, and then it gave the right answer at the end, I mean, the fourth equation, there it is. And if you do the straight equations, the energy density is infinite. Infinite energy density. And there it was, and then I looked at that, and then I went to my mentor and said: I don’t get that at all. I mean, I can read the first line but I just don’t get that. And he said: well ok, we’ll unpack it. And so with him, and I think maybe another professor who both knew physics and mathematics inside and out, they took me through it step by step. And we unpacked four equations you could pack into the middle of one page, and I unpacked that, with prose explanations so I was telling myself how I understood it, into thirty pages. Thirty pages. And with equation upon equation upon equation. But I needed to demonstrate to myself I understand every single step here. I’m not brainwashed. I’m not just saying monkey see, monkey do. But yes, I think it was about thirty pages, of unpacking those four equations and each time explaining, and this is how this next one follows, here’s how this one follows. Nobody else needed to hear that but I did because I’m not very good at math, but then I did get to the end and then when I got to ‘it’s infinite’ I got it. Now I understand it. But for me it was thirty pages of equations and prose explanations, whereas for a really good mathematician, I met one years later and showed him, showed him my thirty pages and, and he was a professionally trained mathematician, and he said, Alan what you concluded to that was obvious in the first page. [laughter] Good! It was obvious to him but it wasn’t obvious to me, otherwise I would have just read those four equations and said I got it. Erm, and that was a service, and that’s from a person really well trained. He sees, bop bop bop bop, got it. bop bop bop bop, got it. And you’re finished in five minutes. But for me it’s probably a month or two of working through those thirty pages and explaining each step of the way. It’s similar. It’s similar. And so, for a person like [“Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche” as “Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso” is also known] the junior tutor of His Holiness, he would see, oh yeah. The my-ness of the cell phone is not found among its parts, it’s not separate. It’s simply imputed upon that which is not mine, yep, everything else the same. [laughter] I’m serious. Yeah. If you have that kind of brilliance you see it. Oh, you didn’t get that? Ok, well then we’ll take more examples. You know, and then you take it step by step and you spend four years studying Madhyamaka alone in the monastic universities of Tibet.

[01:16:20] Ok, back to the story. So, so there’s the second way, “takes the I as not truly existent. Takes it as a mere name or merely imputed by thought, and the third mode,” and I covered this earlier, maybe it will ring a bell, “the third way does not take the I as real in either of those two ways;” doesn’t see the I as inherently existent and doesn’t see the I as being merely conceptually designated. Neither one. It’s undifferentiated. Right? “Of these three ways of thinking of I, the last,” the third one, as just undifferentiated, not critical, not locking into it, as being inherently existent or being empty of inherent nature, “the last is the designation validly applied to some mere conventional I.” It’s just working with, you know, where’s MaryAnn? Yes, she’s over there, and carrying on. Just like that. Or in a dream. You could be in a lucid dream, right? This is a very good example. You can be in a lucid dream, and in a lucid dream Brendan can appear over there and you say: Brendan have you seen MaryAnn? And I’m lucid. Brendan doesn’t even exist because he’s just an apparition to my mind but he looks like Brendan, so Brendan can asks me, the lucid dreamer, Have you seen Mary-Kay? In the context of this dream, because that’s where I am, but I’m completely lucid, I can say: yeah Brendan, of course, haven’t you seen her? she’s right over there. No delusion. And I’m dreaming, but within this context Brendan is over there, would you like to know who he is? He’s called Brendan, her name’s Mary-Kay, get to know each other, you know, but it’s light. It’s just nominal. That would be using the words. In that case you’re actually seeing the emptiness of it. But you could use the words even without seeing the emptiness and just not, not reifying, be hovering, floating a bit, ok?

[01:18:18] So, “The middle,” and that is the one who sees the I as not truly existent, “occurs only in the mindstream of one who has definitely attained the Madhyamika view, such a person has realised emptiness. Only they actually see the I as not inherently existent, and does not occur in others.” If you don’t realise it, then there you go. “And the first is grasping at the self of persons.” Reifying the self of persons. “Taking another person as one’s referent object, what you’re focusing on, and grasping that as truly existent, another person, is grasping at a self of persons,” remember there is the self or identity of phenomena and the self of persons, these are the two categories. If you’re focusing on someone else and you’re reifying them, that’s called grasping at a self or reifying the self of persons, but it is not the connate grasping of I.”

[01:19:23] The connate grasping of I is focus only on yourself. It’s simply a definitional issue. We don’t need to make a big deal of this, but the [01:19:32 Tibetan term?] as it’s called in Tibetan, the grasping to the I, that’s only you, but [01:19:37 Tibetan term?], grasping at the true existence of the self of people, well that could be anybody, ok? This is just terminological finessing. “The connate grasping at I,” this is just technical speech, “or the view of the transitory,” and that’s this whole composite, this aggregation of transitory bodily processes, bodily qualities, mental qualities, mental events, all of them in a state of transition, all of them in a state of flux, alright. “The view of the transitory as being inherently existent.” Ok. Now a lot is packed into that. [01:20:16 Tibetan phrase] it’s called in Tibetan. The grasping to the [01:20:20 Tibetan phrase] the composite of phenomena that are in the process of being destroyed.

[01:20:24] “So the connate grasping at I, which is also called the view of the transitory, the delusional reifying view of the transitory, is the afflictive discrimination that grasps as inherently existent the object that has been intended,” the object you’re focusing on, “the I of one’s own mindstream.” Ok, it’s dense. But hopefully it’s clear. And the I of one’s own mindstream that’s just what we were looking at several minutes ago. “That latter is produced by its own cause.” This connate grasping to the I is produced by its own cause. That is, it’s just a habit. Earlier propensities lead to it happening again, which store more propensities and lead to it happening again. “That latter’s produced by its own cause, a subtle grasping at the self of phenomena.” This is very important. This is a Madhyamaka theme, a “Perfection of Wisdom” theme, ah, that I think is very deep, very important, and is mostly not to be found. Hardly to be found in the Pali canon or in the Theravada tradition.

[01:21:33] In the Pali canon or in the Theravada tradition, the kind of analysis, the Buddha himself does it: look through all your body parts, do you see anything that is I? Right? Individually or collectively. Look through all your mental processes, your feelings, your discernments, mental afflictions, thoughts, emotions, so forth, do you see any of them, are any of them individually or all of them collectively you? Ok, how about this complex? This whole array of bodily and mental events, individually or collectively are any of them you? The answer is “no” all the way through. And then you can ask: ok, apart from this, these five aggregates of form and mental events and so forth; apart from them, setting them all aside, with all their complex interactions, all the enormously complex interactions of the brain, almost inconceivably complex, apart from all of that, do you exist as something separate from that, autonomous from, apart from? No evidence. No evidence. Ok. And on that basis you can say the five aggregates are empty of the self, and the self does not exist as something apart from them, independent of them. Now that, I think, all Theravada Buddhists would accept. With really good sound reasoning.

[01:22:45] Does that mean that the self doesn’t exist at all? One can easily lead to that conclusion then you have lapsed into nihilism. Right? And they don’t do that. Ok. They don’t do that. Most Theravada Buddhists are certainly not nihilists. And Buddha was certainly not advocating nihilism. How you do reinstate the self conventionally, well, different Theravadans have some different views there. But I won’t linger there, but there’s a lot of agreement there, right? Non-self; emptiness of self. Right. None of the parts are the self, the whole aggregate of body-mind is empty of some autonomous self, an agent, a person, like that. But that’s pretty much where the analysis stops because by and large, apart from the Bhikkhuni Vajira and then Nagasena, the chariot, both times using the chariot as an analogy, by and large it is assumed without being challenged that the five skandhas, your physical form, your whole physical aggregate, and your feelings, and your discernments, and all mental formations, and all your six modes of consciousness, and the entire physical world around you, are inherently real. It’s metaphysical realism. It’s not something you learn from the Pali canon, like you’ve just been indoctrinated into a Buddhist worldview, or you learned a Theravada interpretation of the Pali canon, it’s an assumption we have already and it’s not very explicitly challenged in the Pali canon or the Theravada by and large, it’s kind of implicitly or explicitly accepted. Right. But then we do have Nagasena coming along and saying, you know, challenging the King: did you walk here? Because I didn’t find the chariot anywhere, neither among its parts nor apart from its parts. He’s doing exactly the same analysis that are commonly done in all schools of Buddhism with respect to the self, the person, and our relationship with our body-mind, and then he’s doing this like, whoa! You just stepped outside the box. And you did this to a chariot. And you aren’t actually mocking the King when you’re doing it, which Galileo did to the Pope. Generally not a good idea. [laughter] Ok? They’ll send you to your room, You stay in your room. You’re grounded for life. That’s what happened to Galileo.

[01:25:05] But Nagasena, then, took that same reasoning and applied it to a chariot. Well, if you apply it to a chariot, where do you stop? Where do you stop? Is there something special about chariots? And the answer from the Madhyamaka perspective that’s the smoothest segue into the Perfection of Wisdom, the Madhyamaka, and all that, and it’s right there from a Sravaka arhat, Nagasena. And interestingly, in the first East-West dialogue between a Buddhist and a representative of Western culture, a Greek king. You know? Very interesting. And in the Heart Sutra [01:25:43 Tibetan phrase?], having recognised that the self, the person, is empty of inherent nature, [01:25:55 Tibetan phrase?] the five skandhas too are empty of inherent nature. Well now, well the avalanche has started now. Now the avalanche has started. Nagasena starts it with throwing a pebble at a chariot. And then just watch the pebbles fall. I mean, what stands up to that avalanche? Elementary particles? Galaxies? space? Time? Matter? Energy? What stands up to that kind of ontological analysis of parts and wholes? And any entity that has attributes gets cut down with the same analysis. Which means that the self, you, I, we’re no more empty than a chariot, or a piece of lead, or a planet, or a galaxy, or a universe. No more, no less. And for exactly the same reason. So what the Panchen Rinpoche is saying here is you may have gained some insight into the emptiness of yourself, which after all is a bit abstract, and we find neuroscientists saying there’s no self. We find psychologists, some academic psychologists saying the word ‘self’ has no referent, and it’s not that hard to draw that conclusion, and so forth.

[01:27:10] But even if you have that insight, some insight into the emptiness of your own inherent nature, that you exist only nominally, if you’re still reifying your body, reifying your feeling, your thoughts, your emotions, your mental activities and states of consciousness, if you’re still reifying them then the great demon of reification will come back and bite you in the ass. It’s going to get you from behind because it’s still there, it’s unquestioned. You’ve just lopped the, it’s like a weed. I spent hundreds of hours pulling weeds at fifty cents an hour when I was a teenager, and I know very well if you just pull up, we all know this, if you just pull off the top, the easy part, so the guy who’s paying you doesn’t see it any more. You know, just pull it off and the root’s perfectly happy down below. You see them play that! [loud laughter] Can you come back? Those doggone weeds came back. Oh really! [laughter] So that’s it. You’ve cut off the part above ground and the whole root system of reifying your body and mind, your five skandhas, untouched. And that’s why he’s saying if you’ve not eradicated the reification of your skandhas, the reification of self will return. That’s what he’s saying right here, I think that’s very compelling. These are for us to evaluate, each of us. I’m not just here to tell you this is something you have to believe. I find that very compelling.

[1:28:40] So, “That latter’s produced by its own cause a subtle grasping at the self of phenomena.” Again, I was going to say the identity of phenomena but self, many people accept that, fine. As long as they know what it means. But it’s something that we connately grasp to, the inherent nature, the identity of all types of phenomena. It’s just a nominal difference. I’m not going to make a big deal out of it. “As stated by the arya Nagarjuna as long as there’s grasping at the aggregates,” grasping here means reification of, “there will be grasping at an I in them. There will be reification of the I amongst the aggregates. When there is grasping at I, or reification of I, there is also karma. That empowers the activation of karma that follows you from lifetime to lifetime, and through karma there is rebirth.” Very pithy. Very to the point. And, I find it very compelling. “Since it is the root of samsara, one cannot abandon self-grasping without repudiating the fixated object that is the object of that grasping. For the King of Reasoning Dharmakirti states.” This is very very dense. It’s clear, it’s straight, but he’s compacting an awful lot in a few words. It’s very important. And that is so we reify all kinds of stuff. Ok? But then we’re not reifying when we’re in deep dreamless sleep. You know, your conceptual mind is dormant. You’re not reifying yourself, or sleep, or anything else. You’re just asleep. Right? Go into deep samadhi. You may not be reifying anything there. Conceptual mind is shut down. You’re not labelling, you’re not conceiving, and so forth. Or you may just learn how to just so rest, let’s say in open presence, just totally rest, now with your eyes wide open, your senses all wide open and just totally rest and think maybe this is Dzogchen, I’m just totally[at rest], I’m vivid, I’m clear, I’m discerning, I’m totally at rest, whatever thoughts are coming up I just let them arise and pass, and I’m just resting in this openness, this spaciousness, utterly at ease, mental afflictions come up, they don’t afflict. I’m seeing appearances, and I’m not reifying anything, and maybe I’m a vidyadhara. Ok? Very easy to think. Because, for that time, as far as you can tell, you’re not grasping at or reifying anything. Right? So you can say well this is much easier than Madhyamika. [chuckle] I just stopped grasping. I just turned off the switch. Turned off the motor of reification and I’m just resting here. The fool on the hill, you know, that’s it. Is it enough? That’s what he’s getting at right here. And the answer comes from one of the greatest epistemologists and logicians in the whole history of Indian Buddhism. Dharmakiti, And the answer is it’s not enough. It’s not enough to stop reifying, any more than it’s enough to stop smoking. Or, I saw an article yesterday, the biggest losers, the people who are extremely overweight and then they have a contest to see who can lose the most weight, and that’s a contest. People find that entertaining I guess. You know? But then when the show’s over and somebody got the prize for being the biggest loser, what happens to those people who lost three hundred, four hundred pounds? Pretty much they get it back. They lost it, they found it again. You know. And so it wasn’t enough to lose the weight. It wasn’t enough to stop eating too much. It’s not enough to stop smoking. It’s not enough to stop drinking. You have to know: this will kill me. You have to know it so compellingly that knowing that that will kill me, know that this will destroy my health, know that this will, you know, have a lot of negative impact for everyone around me who loves me. You have to know that and not just stop. Maybe somebody says you stop or I’ll punish you. Ok, I’ll stop, until that person goes away. Oh good, now I won’t be punished. Not enough to just stop. This is what Dharmakirti and this is what Panchen Rinpoche is saying.

[1:32:48] At this point I have to haul out one of my favourite psychological jokes. At least half of you have heard it. Please laugh at the appropriate time. [laughter] The little boy who thought he was a kernel of corn. You remember? It’s a great story. But it exactly illustrates this point. Ok? It really does. It’s a nice joke, it’s funny, but it’s a good joke because it’s smart. So the story, everybody, I’m sure, somebody listening by podcast doesn’t know what I’m about to say, I’m about to entertain you. Everybody else, be patient. There was a little boy who had the psychosis of believing, delusionally, that he was a kernel of corn, a little grain of corn, and his parents who were living out on a farm were upset that their son was dysfunctional thinking he was a kernel of corn. So they sent him off to a mental institute, a mental asylum. He got intensive sustained therapy and eventually they released him from the asylum and said we think your son is fine and so the son is released and he comes back home and his parents greet him with open arms, happy to see little Johnny is home and they ask him first off “Johny do you think you’re a kernel of corn?” He says, “no I’m not, I’m fine, I’m not a kernel of corn.” So then they’re relieved, everybody’s happy, hanging out, until a few days later Johnny comes rushing in, slams the screen door behind him, he’s trembling, he’s quaking, obviously terrified out of his wits and his parents come and say “Oh Johnny, you don’t think you’re a kernel of corn again, do you?” and he says “No, but the chickens out there don’t know that.” [laughter]

[01:34:22] It’s good, yeah? [laughter] And it perfectly illustrates this point. That he’d stopped for a while. The therapist told him “Don’t think you’re a kernel of corn. You’re not a kernel of corn. Don’t think that. Don’t think that. People get upset. Your parents are really unhappy, they’re freaking out. Stop thinking that. Stop thinking that.” And then he learned “Ok, I’ll stop thinking that.” Until he’s out among the chickens and he hasn’t realised that he’s not a kernel of corn, he’s just stopped thinking that way. But he couldn’t persuade the chickens to not identify him as a kernel of corn and therefore he’s panic-stricken. Right? You have to realise that that self that you apprehend when you reify yourself doesn’t exist at all. It’s not enough to stop reifying. When you do reify and you identify how you appear to yourself, how you are conceived by yourself when you’re reifying yourself, when you see that that reified self that you’re identifying with does not exist at all, which of course is not to say you don’t exist at all, but the object of your self-concept when you’re reifying yourself, that doesn’t exist at all. Like the Napoleon right here sitting on this couch, or this chair. When you realise THAT, then you won’t grasp to that which you know to be non-existent. Because you’re really free of it. Once you know that there is no such self, then you won’t grasp onto that which you know doesn’t exist. That’s what he’s getting at. It’s a really crucial point. And in Tibetan Buddhism itself is often overlooked. We get phrases like: [01:35:57 Tibetan phrase] among the four partings and four sets of cravings from the Sakya tradition. If grasping occurs, there is no view. Well that is true. That is true. If reification occurs you don’t have a view of the Middle Way. That is true. But if you just stop grasping that doesn’t mean you have the view. That just means for a while you stopped grasping. Maybe you’re comatose. Maybe you’ve just had general anaesthesia. Maybe you’re just sitting like the Fool on the Hill with a blank mind gazing into the sky with a happy smile. But if you haven’t realised that you, for starters, do not exist inherently then it will come back. It will come back. And one easy way for it to come back is come out of your cave and have somebody insult you. [laughter] And, er, see what comes up!

[01:36:50] Ok. That took a long time. Are we already? But let’s quote Darmakirti. I think we can go faster in the future but hopefully this was meaningful. I know I went this tangent, this tangent, but it was intentional, and the whole point here is that we’re not here as an intellectual exercise. We don’t need to be in retreat for that. We can do an online course. Not, there’s nothing wrong with online courses, but nobody needs to come here, and travel halfway around the world and so forth, to have an intellectual course on Madhyamika. There are many good books, many good online courses. Really really good. Right? Don’t need that. This is a place where we can receive teaching and immediately integrate it with practice. And have nothing else to do. You know? No other demands on our time. That’s really making the best use of this time here. This is not a time just to acquire information for the sake of information. So “Dharmakirti states: without repudiating, or seeing the absence of, its object,” “it” is referring to the reifying mind, that reifies oneself. Without repudiating its object, without seeing the absence of its object, “you will not abandon, you will not be able to abandon self-grasping, or reification. So the fixated objects of grasping at a truly existent individual, is one. Grasping at a truly existent I.” So individuals more general, you, he, she and they and so forth. Grasping at the true existence of I; that’s more up close and personal oneself. “Grasping at a truly existent person or persons, individual and persons, drawing a subtle distinction there; these are respectively, the fixated object is a truly existent individual, truly existent I, and truly existent person thus it’s necessary to eradicate them.

[01:38:38] So, we didn’t make much headway in the text but I think now that we’ve laid groundwork we can move more quickly. And in fact the very next one is going into practice. Because he’s also, this is a meditation manual, this is not a Madhyamika treatise just to learn how to debate and all of that, and get a theoretical understanding. He’s giving you just enough theory to put it right into practice and that’s where he’s going immediately. And that’s where we’ll go tomorrow. As for eradicating them, ok? “As for eradicating they’re to be viewed as not truly existent because having ascertained that a person is not truly existent, one accustoms oneself to that view, and reverses grasping at the person as truly existent. For these reasons I will first demonstrate on the basis of experiential pith instructions.” Now we know it’s about practice. “The way the object of negation appears and the way it is grasped.” Ok? So he’s really set this up. Really set, and now he’s ready to go right into pith instructions. Whenever you see that term [01:39:44 Tibetan term] or Upadesh in Sanskrit, you know, ok, this is where the rubber hits the road. Here’s where you take the theory, the categories, the nomenclature and so forth, and now here’s how you apply it. Here’s how you take the medicine, and actually can really get some benefit. Ok?

[01:39:58] Olaso. Kept you on a little bit late but I won’t apologise because I don’t feel sorry. [laughter] Enjoy your evening. See you tomorrow.

Transcribed by Brian Mitchell

Revised by Kriss Sprinkle

Final edition by Rafael Carlos Giusti

Discussion

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