another one. Or the very thing that was beneficial or wholesome, it now starts to become, I have a problem, even though it may be still in the wholesome realm, basically, it starts to deteriorate and to shift again. So it's very much socially conditioned, these values. Once you enter the path, however, you're beyond that. But then within the path, you still follow some of the similar rules of watching what you're doing, but then it's not any longer social. But prior to the path, you're in the world and social phenomena will determine, depending on what part of the universe you live in, what you call good will be determined by that. So morality in this sense is what we call relative morality. It's on the side of the morality as though morality, we're talking about something that actually happens.

[01:06]

In other words, you believe in karma, so then society will have an effect. But from the more basic point of view, both are stirring, both are playing with your karmic inheritance of having a body and a mind. Both are stirring it up. And it's just a question of which type you make and the value of it will be depending on your culture. And nothing, you can't say that eating a lot, producing a lot of weight in one culture is good, in another culture it's bad. So in the sports culture, it's good. But in the intellectual culture, it's bad. Or in the meditator's culture, it's bad. There is an absolute standard, but the absolute is not a standard.

[02:36]

But there is something behind absolute morality and relative morality. and absolute morality. Yeah, absolute morality we call what? No morality. Absolute morality is the actual existence of morality. That's behind usual absolute morality and relativistic or relative morality. Something's behind both of those. And it's free of karma. It's even before the stirring up. I mean, it's even before that which is stirred up. So if you're in a neutral situation, you start stirring it up. Even before that, the nature of that is absolute morality, which we call various fancy names, like non-action. It's the path. You know, Buddhist path is what we mean by morality.

[03:39]

And depending on where you are, it will look different ways. If you're very much caught up in the world, the Buddhist path will be certain definite acts. But when you're not so attached, it won't be so definite. So Buddhism starts out by being, I think for people in a very agitated state of mind, Buddhism for them may be somewhat, look like absolute morality. And as they become a little bit better off, they may see that these things are relative. But that still isn't relative position. Because you just, the only reason why you can see that is because you've been practicing absolute morality for a while. So it's not really relative morality in the sense of, well, it's all just conditioned by society, so it doesn't really matter. That's a problem of relative morality.

[04:46]

But anyway, Germany paid for Second World War. Whether it paid enough or not, the story's not over yet. Now Germany is recovering. Is the years of post-World War II, is that sufficient punishment for what they did during Second World War? Well, anyway, it's not over. I mean, it's not like they've recovered financially, but, you know, morally speaking... I don't think you'd see that Germans are free from their karma. Once again, it isn't just Germany that allowed that to happen. The whole world is paying for that, what they did. So, you know, it worked out. If you look, I think you'll find it works out. It's not that you can't tell by the results, it's the results by which you do tell.

[05:54]

That's the only way you tell, in terms of good or bad. There's no good and bad aside from you telling, and you tell only by the results. And if you don't know the results yet, well then that's what you say. When the results are such and such, then you say that you feel that that's what it was. It's always determined by the results, and before you Before you get the returns in on what you've done, that's what you think it is. So if you do something and the result is postponed, then you think that it's good until it's bad. Now, if you know that certain things have a delayed reaction, if you know that already, well, then you just wait for it to come. And when it comes, then you're justified, but you know already it's going to take a while. Like, if you need certain things, you know it takes a few hours for the effect to come.

[06:55]

But it's only in terms of the effect that you judge it. The thing in itself... What? What? Right. That's right, it is. Yes, you can do that. You can change countries, for example, and change the result of your karma.

[08:00]

But it isn't exactly that you change the result of your karma as it is that you just do further karma. Some people do that. Some people get fat and can move to another country where they're here. They like fat people. Some people go to Mexico. I know some blonde people who moved to Mexico. Because blonde people are popular in Mexico. Blonde women are very popular in Mexico. And blonde men are very popular in the Near East. The men in the Near East like blonde men. So if you're homosexual, it's good to, if you're blonde homosexual, it'd be good to go to Turkey. What did you say? And if you're a woman, if you're a blonde woman, it's good to go to South America. If you want to, you know, have a lot of sex.

[09:06]

If you think that would be a good thing to happen to you. On the other hand, if you're a blonde woman and you want to meditate, it's probably good to shave your head off. But on the other hand, you've got to be careful because people might hassle you for having no hair, so they're staying indoors. So you can, if you happen to wind up with a certain color hair or a certain shape body, you can arrange it so that you're you're in vogue someplace. And then it's like you almost, you change the goodness or badness of what you wind up with. But that way of thinking, again, that will have results too. That manipulation will also produce results, which generally will be bad.

[10:10]

Because they're rather selfish, but not so bad. It's not so harmful to move from one culture to another where you... you'll be more popular. You know, people move from Minnesota to San Francisco because there's a job market for their job where they move from San Francisco to Minnesota. So intellectuals generally leave the Bay Area to go to the Midwest or to the South where they can get good jobs at universities but they can't even get hired in San Francisco because so many intellectuals want to live here. They couldn't get a job in New York or San Francisco, but they can get a job in Mississippi or Georgia or Nebraska or Minnesota or whatever. And same thing, maybe a computer programmer can't get a job in Minneapolis, but it can easily get a job in San Francisco, something like that. Those kind of manipulations seem to be changing your karma.

[11:15]

But it's just karma on top of karma. And whether it's a good or bad thing, you will judge for yourself. You're the one who's the final executor of it. And you'll notice that it will, given the decorum of the situation, if you follow it, given what you think is a high standard for yourself, if you keep that in mind about yourself and act in accordance with it, if you do those two things, you will notice that in order to do them, you'll have to be concentrated. you'll have to have confidence, mindfulness, and so on. In order to keep tuned in to your sense of self-respect and decorum, a number of other good dharmas have to be there. Okay? And that will produce beneficial results within the context of what you consider to be decorous. Okay? So you have a definition of decorous, and if you keep tuned in to that definition, and you have a...

[12:23]

Definition of something worthy of respect in yourself. And you keep tuned into that definition of respect. Keep tuned into it. Be confident about it. Be mindful of it. And sure enough, you'll get those kinds of things back. You'll get decorous situations. So if you think black robes are decorous things to wear, and you wear them, And if you think having clean clothes is decorous and you clean your clothes, the only way that's going to happen is to be mindful, concentrated, indulgent, and so on and so forth. As a result, you will get clean robes in a world where other people probably have clean robes too. That's the way the world works because that's the way you think it. That's karma. If you think of yourself in such a way that you don't respect yourself, if you have some idea of respect which you don't hold to yourself, you have some standard of goodness and you say, I'm not that way.

[13:36]

And if you have some sense of decorum and you say, I'm not that way, then you will get the opposite of what you think is decorous. So if you think being clean is good and then you're dirty, then you'll get dirty. And you'll think that's bad, because you think that that was good, and you did the bad, so you got the bad. But you could think that being dirty is good, and then if you concentrate on being that, you'd be dirty. So you're the one who decides what's decorous. If you think getting hit over the head with building clubs is nice, then concentrate on those things, and you'll get hit, and that'll be fine. Other people in society around you may not agree. You're the one who tunes in. So you get what you think. That's all. Most people go along with their society, however, and they have similar values just because it's a lot of extra work to keep switching everything into the photographic negative of what everybody else is doing.

[14:41]

So for simplicity, we often agree. And then there's varieties within little subgroups. But there's such a thing as asceticism, you see, wherein a certain subgroup does turn everything the other way. Within a group of ascetics, all the switches are turned back the other way. And that's considered to be decorous in that situation. And there it's almost always the opposite of the mass. But most people prefer to be comfortable. They prefer to be uncomfortable. But it's still very closely related, you see, to the usual. Anyway, maybe, I don't know if you want to talk more about this, but that's the Theravada view and the Sarvastavadan view. The Vaibhashikan view is you can go directly from wholesome to unwholesome without an intervening neutral.

[15:44]

They don't say you have to go back. They say you can change trips instantly. Take away a good one. and there's a bad one right behind it. And the way they explain this is by virtue of the viprayukta samskara called prapti. So a prapti, you can be in a good state and you can possess or pull in, acquire a bad one by virtue of this special dharma. So the series, the individual series, has an event, and this event is temporary or impermanent, goes away, and you can just simply acquire by means of a bad property, which is bad because it acquires a bad state. You can pull in a bad one right away. So here you can go directly from good to bad.

[16:48]

Practically speaking, you can be sitting in a state of meditation, for example, the easiest way to talk about it. And you're just being completely decorous. You're sitting there in a very beautiful posture and full of faith and the glory of emptiness. double already. And then you can just sort of get bored with it all and start and hate the person next to you. So that, just for a little entertainment. I guess I always looked upon it. It seems like it's something. I mean, this is the way I think about it. It's kind of like there's some kind of transition. It's been a good state of mind. I mean, there's kind of something that feels like a result, and you never choose that. Well, that's fine to think it that way.

[17:56]

Then you're Theravada. Nothing wrong with Theravadas. They have, you know, a lot of nice coconuts down around their temples. It's hot up in Gandhara. It's not necessarily good to be a Vaibhashaka. They're a little bit smarty-pantsy anyway. Yeah, don't sit under a tree. Fair youth. That's fine to think it that way, but I think you can also say many times that you can also see that you can go... When you were saying, when you were talking about splashing water, you know, I guess there's... Splash water... [...] Yeah, and that's the way you do it.

[19:04]

You're doing something very decorous, and how fast can the mind change from thinking of something decorous to thinking of something undecorous? How fast can it change? The easiest way to see it, I think, is in a very precise state of consciousness, actually, where you're... where the quality of good is very highly defined. And by slightly changing that, by virtue of the high definition, by slightly changing, you can produce a tremendous change. When the mind becomes very clear, It's a very small thing to just, for example, shift the intention from non-ego-based to ego-based.

[20:10]

Ego-based and non-ego-based are separated by a concept. You don't have to go into a neutral concept to then give rise to an ego-based concept. And shifting some kinds of states of mind from non-ego-based to ego-based is all it takes to make them selfish. Or to shift from faith to doubt. You don't have to go necessarily into a transitional space to switch the attitude. You can do it very quickly. And you can turn what is beneficial from the point of view of the meditator to unbeneficial from the point of view of the meditator. And as I say, it's easiest, in some sense, easiest time to see how fast it can happen is in a very well-developed, good state of consciousness. Like, you know, if you're water skiing or doing something at a high speed and a little bump can, you can see how influential a tiny bump can be.

[21:13]

And tiny bumps can come up very quickly, very suddenly. If you're going slowly over a rough surface, then you have to run over a big hill to make a big difference. And you can see those kind of, they're very noticeable and they come up gradually. But if you're moving at a very high speed and you're very tuned into your action, then a little tiny change can be almost black and white. So I would say that the easiest place to understand where you can make transitions rapidly is in a very refined state. And whereas in somewhat duller states, you can see that things happen more slowly or you have transition time or warnings or things. And then you can see that... So in situations of conceptual analysis, then I think you can see that concepts can go from plus to minus instantly.

[22:15]

If that's the case, you can go from good to bad instantly. I think you might be... Vaibhashikas are more conceptual than the, generally speaking, the Vaibhashikas are more philosophical and conceptual and they can see more that way that you can make these kind of switches and mental switches are really powerful. Whereas the Southern school is a little bit more experiential in a more accommodated more accommodated human sentiment or something. It's not so... Refined? Well, refined in one sense, but also maybe more refined, more gentle, maybe. Maybe the northern school, the northern Abhidharmas are more scaling or they're more sharp or radical. Yes?

[23:18]

I don't quite understand the practice. is it that you prompted doubt or did you object to faith? Well, you do both at the same time. Your question could be asked, is faith anything other than the apropity of vichikitsa, is vichikitsa anything other than the apropity of faith? And that's an interesting question, which we could talk about. But certainly you could say for sure that they don't coexist, so one is lost when the other one's gained, that's for sure. And it just takes a moment. You don't have to drop one and then have neither for a while and then pick up the other one. You go like this. at the same moment.

[24:20]

They can't close this. And one is an affirmation of the object of perception. And the other is either an ambivalence. I'm not sure whether it's ambivalence. I should maybe examine that, whether it's ambivalence or denial. Yeah, whether vichikitsa is that kind of ambivalence, unsureness, or whether it's denies. So I don't, I'm just saying that the, It looks like the Vabashakas are in a way of saying you can instantaneously change your attitude from good to bad.

[25:23]

Consciousness, you can instantaneously change consciousness from good to bad. Of course, they also admit that you can go from... So your experience, they also agree. You can go from good to neutral. And neutral can be for a long time and then go to bad. That's also here. But the one... the crossing out of that possibility of making that conceptual switch instantaneously, they allow. So I think their system allows the experience that you're talking about, but it also allows an experience that the Theravadans say can't happen. So there, in a way, in a way, I like the system that allows the most experience. Now, All systems, somehow they won't, some experiences they won't allow. I mean, all Abhidharma systems seem to not allow some experiences. And that's the point about Abhidharma.

[26:28]

That's where it falls down. So we're all here learning. In one sense, you feel good when you look at this chart and you realize that not anything's possible. I mean, that not everything's possible. You feel somewhat good. Like if all the different transitions were good, you might not feel like you were learning anything. But you feel somewhat good when you see them. Or if they're just one possible, you know. Just one. If these two checks were the only ones that you could have, you'd say, well, what's all this other stuff about? Why did they make all those squares? This Abhidharma's not very interesting. But when you see all these different checks out here, you feel pretty good, you know. Something to learn, and there's something happening here. It looks like these guys really know what they're talking about. Little star over here. Feel pretty good. But if it was completely filled in, you wouldn't feel so good. Because then, well, so what? But there's some holes. And the holes and the patterns are, there's something to them. But really, anything's possible.

[27:35]

Because in Abhidharma, they say, for example, that you can't see with your eyes. I mean, your ears. You can't see with your ears. But in Mahayana, you can see with your ears. The way you see with your ears doesn't deny this kind of stuff. It's through understanding this stuff that you see how to see with your ears. So it's not just that whatever you see, it's not just moral relativity. It's first moral absolutism, then moral relativity, and then something beyond both. Until you understand that eyes see and ears hear, then the teaching of hearing with the nose is lost on you and that teaching wouldn't be given to you. Remember, the person who was so excited about understanding that the inanimate beings teach with their whole body and mind constantly and that you only can really know by hearing with your eyes,

[28:46]

This person was the one who, when he heard the Heart Sutra, then he said, no eyes, no ears, no nose. He said, but I have eyes, I have ears, I have nose. Okay? He heard this teaching and he questioned it. So that's where he started. He started by saying, hey, what's this Mahayana stuff? What are you trying to pull? And finally, he could talk that way himself from his own experience. So we learn this chart, but then we'll soon find out that actually some of the things they say can't happen. Well... So generally I feel good about a system that allows more experience in their explanation, that can explain why more things can happen. But sometimes the Theravadas that way, that they say, they'll allow things which the Vaivashikas won't allow.

[29:49]

Like they allow more colors than the Vabashikas allow. Because the Vabashikas want to have a simple system of colors. So they have just a... Oh, not colors, but... Yeah, colors too. The Theravadas have 39 colors. Something like that. But you can just see if they just happen to stop writing, they could have kept going. I don't know if that point was culminated. But... Anyway... I think it's the case of that although they have a simpler number of consciousnesses, the transitions that they're saying are possible are greater. That they're allowing some to happen that you can conceive of, that you can conceptualize. They're saying some of those can happen and these Theravadas are saying that they don't think they can happen. But once again, the reason why they say they can't happen is because it violates part of their teaching. So they're allowing a little bit more of the range of possible experiences.

[30:55]

So what I would suggest you do here is just try to see if you can think about these transitions and see if you understand why some can happen and some don't. Like if you fill out this chart on the board here, can you understand why each one's possible? Because they don't explain. and why others don't happen you see why that's so we've just talked about those first two there in some detail of course they're the most important these uh those poor are karmically speaking those are the big ones right our own hometown Kamadatu there But the other ones being more subtle will require a little bit more thinking. So next time we'll fill out more of the chart and then we'll see if we understand why.

[32:03]

Why? Any questions?

[32:09]

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