Okay, last time we were discussing Karik 67, 68b, chapter 2. So if you have a good mind, a wholesome state of consciousness, in the Kama Datu, nine minds can come after it.

[01:14]

So you can go from the wholesome state of consciousness to any of the other four states of consciousness of the Kama Datu, good, bad, and two kinds of neutral. And we discussed last time quite a bit about how it is that you can go from good to good nobody has much problem with, but good to bad is quite a problem for some people. Any further questions on how you go from good to bad? Or bad to good, yes? I wasn't too sure about whether the moment previous was the only factor. If so, it would seem that we really couldn't go from good to bad or otherwise. Is the moment previous the only factor?

[02:21]

In the cause of the moment present? No, it's only not. But you asked the question rhetorically. Is that what you mean? No. It's just that the moment previous is the only problem. Because one of the causes, if you have a moment of consciousness, one of the causal conditions there is the previous moment. The fact that the previous moment has gone away makes it possible in some sense for this moment to exist. You can't have this moment without the previous one going away. But that's not the only cause bearing on the determination of this. To example, there's also, there's also, you know, alambana pratyaya, that's samanantar pratyaya, there's also alambana pratyaya, adipati pratyaya, and heta pratyaya.

[03:29]

Okay? These are other causal factors in the determination of the nature of this consciousness, this present consciousness. But anyway, whenever you have the arising of a consciousness, there's always samanantra pratyaya relative to the previous. When you think about the previous moment, then it's in such a causal relationship to the previous moment. But of course, that's not the only cause factor. Is that clear? Is that what you wanted to talk about? We just didn't talk about the other ones because the other ones aren't a problem. But what is a problem for some Buddhists is the fact that good could directly proceed with no break. Bad. And the Theravadans just, they don't see it happening that way.

[04:30]

They don't see good immediately preceding bad moment. They always see good arising, a good moment arising and a good moment falling back into this stream of consciousness which is neutral and then good arising or bad arising Not good arising, but bad arising out of that neutral stream of consciousness. They only see that route from good to bad. Now, from good to good, they have no problem. From good to good, you don't have to go back to the Blavanga. You don't have to go back there. Just go from good and sort of here in a risen state and just go directly from one risen good. That one drops to another risen good. So you can go good, [...] good. If you go bad, you have to go good, bad, good, good, bad, good, no, good, yeah, good, neutral, bad, bad, neutral, good, bad, [...] neutral, good, [...] neutral, bad.

[05:47]

Or good, neutral, [...] neutral. Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad. Neutral, neutral, neutral, bad. You wouldn't have to do that. You could have bad, bad, bad. Neutral, good, and so on. Those kind of patterns is the ones they see. Now, the Vibhashikas, do they see those kind of patterns? What? Right. Those patterns, the Vaibhashikas will allow that that is, those patterns, they see the same patterns that the Vaibhashikas, that the Theravadans see. They can see those patterns. That's a possible pattern. They don't disagree that you can go from, you know, bad, bad, neutral, neutral, good, neutral, bad, bad, neutral, neutral, good, [...] neutral, bad. That's a pattern they can see. But they can see a pattern that the Theravadans can't see. Namely, they can see good, bad, good, bad, good, bad, good, bad.

[06:51]

It is possible for them. And there, you see, there's a causal situation that they bring in, although they see that the good is directly antecedent cause of the bad, or vice versa. by looking at other kinds of, for example, simultaneous causal things, for example, the prapti. The prapti simultaneous with the given moment of consciousness could bring in, could obtain the bad dharmas. And thereby, there's no problem with how it happens. Because always the prapti, When you have a bad state of consciousness, there's always the present acquisition or present possession of the bad. But in the past, in a good moment of consciousness, you can have the property of a future bad dharma.

[07:57]

And there's no contradiction because property is a viprayukta samskara. See how nice it is that they have viprayukta? So that's why they want it to be Vipayukta, see? Here's a moment of consciousness. This consciousness is good. Kushala. So it has all these nice Kushala dharmas in here. Now, if you have a Prapti in here, Prapti, Prapti of a future bad dharma, a Kushala, Dharma. Then what's the karmic quality of this property if it's acquiring an akushala dharma? What? It's akushala. So then you have an akushala dharma with these kushala dharmas, which doesn't work. But fortunately, they do a borderline here.

[09:02]

And this out here in the area called associated with mind, and out here is not associated with mind. That vipayukta samskara is separate from the consciousness and therefore it doesn't screw up the consciousness. That's why they like to have pravdhi vipayukta. It doesn't exist in mind. This mind has this potential to acquire a future dharma, which is bad. Then when the next moment comes, or whatever moment it is, this pravdhi becomes manifested in the present. And then the then state of consciousness is bad, is unwholesome, is unfortunate. So they can directly follow each other by this kind of mechanism. So that's how the Vaibhashikas explain that it's possible to go from good to bad. It's like beaches, yeah.

[10:07]

but it's not quite sophisticated. Yes? What? They don't use papi at all, no. They don't have it. Papi is not on the Theravada Dharma list. One of the reasons why bijis are more sophisticated is because they can keep bijis in mind. They don't have to put it outside of mind in order to make it work. What? If it's not? How is it? Can you speak to them? originating in mind than receptive sound?

[11:15]

Well, I remember that colors and receptive capacities are also not associated with mind. So there are things that don't originate in mind according to this theory. So the two categories of things that don't originate in mind or the three categories of things that don't originate in mind are what? Rupa. Rupa. We pray to samskaras and the unconditioned. So the mind thinks. Because the mind thinks, it produces, according to this theory. This theory doesn't say that the material dharmas are mind. They say the material dharmas are not mind. But they do say that the material dharmas are due to what?

[12:16]

What? Karma. And the receptive capacities are due to what? Retribution. And which means they're due to karma. And what kind of karma? What? Well, personal karma. And the colors and sounds and smells are due to shared karma. So Abhidharma says that the material world is due to karma. This gross material world, which is what? What? Gross material is what? And what is it? Everybody's talking so quietly. What? The sense fears. They're due to collective karma and then they're gross karma, they're gross material and the subtle material is the receptive capacities.

[13:28]

Okay? Receptive capacities are subtle because they're located but but you can't really see them. You can't really see the receptive faculty of the eye, even though it's right around here on a human being. But beings in intermediate existence can see, but they aren't incarnated. There's other ways to see besides with eyeballs. As you know, various animals do not have eyeballs and plants don't have eyeballs, but they can see. They can receive light and respond to it quite nicely. Some people might say even better than we do, more beautifully.

[14:30]

But they don't have eyeballs, but they do have receptive capacities for light. So that's why it's subtle rupa. It's not the kind of thing you can say that's blue. You can't say that about the eye organ. You can't say, there's an eyeball and it has a blue iris and so on. But you can't say where the... You can say the receptive faculty is located somewhere around there, but you can't say what it is physically. And it's compared to ghee when you melt butter. You get the curd or whatever it is. What do you call them? Pick part of the bottom. If you melt butter. Let it sit. It separates into oil and fat. What's the fat part called? Rue? What? Rue. I can't remember. Anyway, if you melt butter, you get this thick stuff on the bottom, and you get this clear stuff at the top.

[15:35]

The clear stuff's called ghee. It has a location. It's on the top of the stuff, and you can kind of see it. It's not completely transparent, but it's almost, if you look straight down through, you basically see the stuff behind it. It's the same way when you look at the eye. You look to see the eye organ, but actually what you see is is you don't see the eye organ, you see all kinds of material stuff, you know, things that you can see. You don't see the ability to see, you see the things you can see. You see the objects of mind, of eye consciousness. Okay? But it just turns out that the eye receptivity is located around that place that you're looking. It's a kind of... It's a... It's what you call the interesting intersection between the common sense and Buddhist teaching.

[16:38]

It's sort of hard to see which is which sometimes. Okay, so... That's that. And now, property. How does property arise? Property arises from... What? Take a guess. Why do you think I brought this other stuff up? Karma. So, it doesn't arise with mind, but it arises from karma. So, mind thinks, and it produces other minds, and it produces physical capacities. And all of the minds together produce the physical fields. And the mind thinks and produces properties. So properties are non-mind things that are products of mind.

[17:49]

Just like also, which you may eventually get to, a thing called avijjñakti rupa, another kind of rupa. that is produced by karma, that is not associated with mind, but lives in the Dharmadhatu and can be an object of mind. It's a special rupa. Most rupas are object of the sense consciousnesses, but this rupa, although it's material, can be object of mind consciousness. and lives in the Dharmadhatu, which is the realm of objects of the mind. But it's physical. It's not associated with mind, even though it's in the realm of things that mind can see. It's like, it's the mind's tracking of its karma. It's a kind of physical tracking the mind can do of its action.

[18:54]

So anyway, that's how property arises. It arises from karma. Present karma, present property arises from past karma and present karma. Future property arises from past present karma. But it's not associated with mind. Because when mind goes away, property doesn't necessarily go away with it. Property has an independent relationship. It doesn't always come up and go down with it. All the property is also momentary. Okay, so that's, once again, a little bit more talk about how it is that the Vaibhashikas top-explain without saying that good causes bad, because Buddha said good does not cause bad, see? Good doesn't cause bad. That's why they're so excited about this. And bad does not cause good. That's Buddha taught that, and that's true.

[19:59]

But even so, you can have a situation where good is, in a sense, a causal agent for bad because it just happens right before it. So then it's samanamta prajaya, according to Abhidharma theory. So they have to put a lot of energy into explaining this little kink. OK? Yes? I don't understand them. I still don't understand how It's not outside of mind, it's just not associated. Associated, once again, means that you, when something's associated with mind, it has a very influential participation in mind. Something associated with mind will make the mind a certain way. Something that's not necessarily outside of mind, mind can relate to it, it has, for example, property has some relationship to mine because it brings its stuff and tosses it into mine.

[21:02]

It has a working relationship, but it's not one of the gang. It doesn't have the same object, same arising, same falling, same aspect, and so on. It doesn't meet those five criteria. Because it doesn't meet those five criteria, it can be different in some ways. Just like Buddhists sometimes hire Muslims to kill their beef for them. Okay, Buddhists are the property of meat for... Muslims are the property of beef for Tibetan Buddhists and some Indian Buddhists. Now, by doing that, they hope that their mind won't be defiled by the killing of the beef, which is against their precepts. But we can see that there's something going on there. Some separation has occurred. They've made an effort to separate it, and therefore, in some sense, maybe they're not creating unwholesome karma, but something's going on.

[22:04]

And that's how they explain it. Someone says, hey, you're eating meat. How did you pull that one off? Well, I got a Muslim to do it. And same with these minds. Say, hey, you were a good mind a moment ago. Now you have a bad mind. How did you do that? Well, I got a property to do it. When we say that Buddha had no theories, what we mean is that for Buddha, theories aren't theories. I mean, Buddha ran into theory. It wouldn't be that he'd sort of go blind or something.

[23:06]

His ears would dry up and blow away. It's that when Buddha heard a theory, Buddha heard what it was. For him, it wasn't a theory. It was just... For Buddha, theory is like a chocolate chip cookie. So he had no theories in that sense. He also didn't have any chocolate chip cookies. So when you say that... Because it's just purely theoretical. For a Buddhist... A theory is not really a purely theoretical thing. A theory isn't something that's not meditation. So these arise out of meditation and yet they're not really in the sutras. Buddha didn't give this. And even though things arise out of meditation, they can be prajnapati rather than dravia. So all this prajnapati stuff comes out of their contemplations. They look at the material of the teaching of Buddha and contemplate it and meditate on it and study it and discuss it. This is their meditational life. And then they come up with these responses to that, to explain it, to live with it.

[24:10]

And property is one of their responses. So it comes out of the direct experience of working with this material. But Vasubandhu thinks that they don't have to get so heavy-handed about it. He says, yes, I see how the property works, right, but that's your explanation. You're just explaining how this could happen. Okay. I may have a better explanation. Or your explanation may be the best around. But that's just an explanation. It's not a real thing. It's just a fruitful fiction to show how it could be that you could go from good to bad because, once again, the vaibhashikas, in some ways, are allowing more states of consciousness to be real or to be possible, because they not only recognize the ones that the Theravada recognize, but they recognize even more possibilities, namely to go directly from good to bad, which is good in a way.

[25:11]

Now, they could say, okay, well, we just won't have those states of consciousness as allowed, and we can throw our property away. But they say, we'd rather be able to explain all phenomena, and in order to do that, we need some way to do it, so let's use property. And the Yogacarans also want to explain everything, so they use bijis. And bijas are a little bit more sophisticated because they don't have this kind of, they don't feel so manipulative. But they're also just, I mean, bijas are not real either. They're just fictions. They're just concepts to explain. And bijas, I mean, dharmas are called bijas. when you're trying to explain how dharmas work. I mean, there's no such thing as a bija aside from explaining how dharmas work. So the word bija is also an explanatory entity. If you said a bija is a real thing too, well, that's not true either. But bijas are a way to explain to people as you introduce them to the Dharma theory of the yogacharas so that they can meditate on it and then they can sort of realize that all those dharmas have no own being and have no self.

[26:23]

Here, these Vaibhashikas stop at the stage of property and say, yeah, property is real, these dharmas are real. And property is real because it explains how these real things work. Vasubandhu is coming along and saying, hey, wait a minute. I could take this one step further because this property and a lot of these other dhammas you have, especially these viparyukta ones, they're just explanations. They're just these forces that you're conjuring up to bring in to explain how this stuff works, but actually this stuff just works. And of course there's some force in there working because force over time is power. I mean, yeah, force over time is power and makes work. No, no, force times distance. Force times distance is work. And time is work. Yeah, it's work. So force in space and time is work.

[27:29]

So if you observe work, there must be force. And the mind's working, so you must be forced. And if you can't see how it's working among the dharmas, then you can explain how it's working. And that working is a force. So there is a force there, but to call that force a thing, to name it, you can do that, but you're just talking to yourself and your friends. That's all. So even now and today in modern physics, people don't know what force is. They don't know what energy is. Because you can't have force without matter. In other words, You can't have energy without matter. So you can never really say what energy is very well. It's always a dualistic statement. So to say what these, to pinpoint these functions of consciousness, these viprayukta samskaras, and say they're really things, will never really work. But they did it, so vāsabandit tore them apart. But they're not exactly theories, they're just

[28:37]

They're just accommodations to human sentiment. Because as human beings study dharmas, they don't understand how certain things could happen. So they show, they say, oh, you don't, if you've got this and this, you don't understand how that happens? Well, just take this thing over here and put that there and that may be, let's see, that's how it works. And they bring these things in. And they like everything that they bring in to work on, if they have these real things that interact in a certain way and produce another real thing, the thing that explains how these things interact to produce another real thing, that's called a real thing too. So all the things, the basic building blocks, the basic dharmas are real, and all the ways that you say they work among themselves are real, are ultimately things in themselves. And then the next level of concept like karma and rebirth and things like that, and the worlds and transmigration and all that stuff, that level uses a different level of stuff, and that stuff isn't real the same way the dharmas are real.

[29:39]

But when you talk about the mechanisms of dharma, those mechanisms, they say they're real. And Vasubandhu says, the mechanisms aren't real. And that's what Yogacara says too. So you can have emptiness and things, but the processes by which they interact, those aren't real. Those are imputed. So the Vaibhashikas are saying those processes are the viprayukta samskaras and they're real. Vasubandhas start to say, no, those aren't real. You can just say that this and this happen and that produces that. Because Buddha said it happened that way. He said, give me A, give me B, and I'll give you C. Vāsābāna in the Vāvāśikas say, give me A, give me B, and you give me C, and also there's F and G, which explain how you get C from A and B. And they're all in the same status. They're all real.

[30:41]

The next level of the aspect of the self... You can have an idea of self even at the level of karma, at that same level with karma. Because The level of karma, you see, is the overall organization of five skandhas. So at the level of karma, there can already be imputation of self. But some selves don't even operate, they even operate more grossly than that, of course, even at a more conglomerate or composite level than even karma. Some selves don't even recognize karma. But at the level of karma, you can have belief in self.

[31:48]

So, in other words, the teaching of karma can be received by those who are still adhering to self. They can receive and understand it while adhering to self. But if, what? Yeah, in Christianity or whatever, there's a karma teaching, teaching of action and reaction, and how things work in the world, how your thinking produces further thinking. How when you think angry, then you can think depressed. At that level, you can still hold to a self. When you go down to the Dharma level, you can still hold to a self, but at a certain point, you stop thinking, you start thinking in terms of dharmas, and there are just no thoughts of self. After a while, you just, it isn't that you say that self-view is wrong, because self-view is just a certain thing that you put together of certain causes and conditions. It's rather that you drop self-view, because you are operating on a level which you don't, you're not using it anymore. So when you're totally thinking in terms of dharmas, at that point, you enter into the path.

[32:52]

And at the point you enter the path, you drop the adherence to self. You drop satkhaya drishti. But it isn't that you say satkhaya drishti is wrong, you just stop thinking that way. However, there's still self adhering. You're still thinking that dharmas in themselves are actual things. Now, Vasubandhu, at the level of writing this, if we assume he became a yogi-charin later, he's still saying that some dharmas are real. But he says the dhipra yukta samskaras, those are just imputed, and they're not necessary. So he's starting, actually. The level of discussion here is free of self. If you follow this and think like this book, there's no self necessary. And after a while, if something's unnecessary, you may very well drop it. But you still wouldn't have to get rid of the vipayuta samskaras to do that. You could be a selfless arhat and still think that the vipayuta samskaras were things in themselves.

[34:00]

If we assume that some of these vaivashikas attained arhatship, which they probably did. The next level of the bodhisattva practice is to not only see that the that the, what do you call them, the viparita samskaras are just rafts, but all the dharams are just rafts to take you over a certain kind of water. And then when you go out in the next water, you have to throw your raft away and get on a heavy cruiser or a PT boat or whatever is necessary to negotiate the next level of water at the higher or lower. Yes? What's the view of the unconditioned?

[35:10]

What's the view of the unconditioned? I don't understand how. I mean, I can't believe that I don't understand how Vibasca could really believe that they're real, that they're real. Well, real means not that they're real, like ultimately real, but rather that they're the ultimately useful objects, that if you look at those, they're the ultimate liberating principle. So when you look at dharmas from one side, from the unenlightened side, if you look at them exactly, if you can see their own marks from the unenlightened side, and you can see that they all share in the samanya lakshinas of not only rising impermanence and so on, but also ill, impermanence, not self.

[36:16]

If you can see that, If you keep looking at all the dharmas in their own marks and you can only look at them, you can only see dharmas if you know what their own marks are. First you have to find the dharma. The only way you can find the dharma is by its own mark. So then you find one. Oh, here it is. Find it by its own mark. And then you look at it and you say, hey, this is ill. This doesn't have a self and it's impermanent. If you keep looking at dharmas like that pretty soon, you see the flip side. You see it the way it looks from nirvana. But they're the ultimately real thing to look at, the ultimately real entities, is dharmas. Those are the things you should look at as the object of your meditation, in the sense that they're the ultimate, they're the final liberating principle, principles. They don't even arise, actually, according to Aprathisamkhya Narodha. So then you obtain nirvana. So real, in some sense, in this way, means that which works, that which will be the best thing to meditate on.

[37:24]

But you have to do quite a bit of work just to be able to bring them into view. So when you bring them into view, then you say, now I've got the right stuff to look at. So in that sense, dravia doesn't really mean real. It means you've got some substance. You've really got down to something. Okay, so maybe real is not such a good word to use, but thing in itself. You've gotten down to something that's really a thing in itself. It's not a thing due to a whole bunch of other things. It's all by itself, so you can really look at it. I mean, it will stand up to your scrutiny. If you look at it very carefully, you'll really be able to center yourself on it, and you'll really be able to see it's characterized by these, by ill and permanence and not self. And if you're a Mahayana meditator, you'll see it also is characterized by emptiness. But they don't see it as characterized by emptiness, therefore, they think it's a substantial thing.

[38:26]

But if you do zero in on these dharmas and keep them in view and see them at having those marks, for example, on the mark of ill, you can enter the path. Just take those dharmas, keep them in view, know how to see them, keep remembering them, and see them as ill in the kamadhatu, and you enter the Buddha's path through the disciple's path. And bodhisattvas can do this too, but they don't have quite the same attitude because they've got, this is just, this is not only entering the path, as it is for the arhats, they're entering the path too and they're going to keep going, but this path that they're entering, they see it ends right over there. Whereas the bodhisattvas see they're entering this path here and it ends right over there, but they're going way over there. Or actually they're going everywhere like this. So they see their view of it is quite different. So they're not quite as excited about it. So actually see bodhisattvas are much more calm. So that's why it's not actually

[39:36]

those dharmas aren't actually the ultimate liberating principle. They're not really the final substance because actually the level of calm that you attain by them is not so great. Because you're actually a little bit, you still have a kind of short-sighted view and you haven't calmed the whole field like the Bodhisattva is intending to do but hasn't attained yet. So I retract calling these dharmas real. I think it's more accurate to call, to say dharavya is a thing in itself, something you really can meditate on and it won't fall apart under your meditation. So that's the difference. The arhat actually says, yeah, you come down to those dharmas and they really stand up to it. And then you can get rid of them. There's really something there you're dealing with. The bodhisattva finally comes down to that same level of discernment of these dharmas. And he comes to this thing and he hits this diamond, you know, diamond-like solidness of this dharma.

[40:41]

And he says, boy, this really is a little jewel, you know. And then the Bodhisattva keeps looking at it and keeps looking at it and pretty soon the diamond breaks apart. But for the Arhat, the diamond stands up. The diamond turns out to be the adamantine thing rather than their wisdom. Whereas bodhisattvas have a wisdom that can break diamonds. It's called diamond cutter. It can break diamonds. What diamonds? These diamond diamonds here, dharma diamonds. Bodhisattvas vision even breaks those. Nothing stands up, not to mention diamonds. So arhats can break diamonds. Bodhisattvas can break dharmas. So, once again, I think to call these dharmas real is maybe not so good, but let's call them things in themselves, or ultimate liberating entities.

[41:44]

And the arhats call them ultimate liberating entities, bodhisattvas don't. For bodhisattvas, it's the emptiness of those dharmas which is the ultimate liberating principle. That even these ultimate particles These things which appear to be existing in and of themselves for the arhats, for the bodhisattvas, they see further that even these are due to causes and conditions and none of them stand up by themselves. They fall apart into the net of their causation. So it's more like that. And emptiness itself is still not a real thing. Because emptiness also, there's emptiness of emptiness and so on. So emptiness still won't be a kind of something you can get a hold of. So there'll be no self, there'll be nothing that you can apprehend in the end. And you won't even be able to apprehend if nothing gets apprehended. This is the only thing that will stand up, and it's not much.

[42:49]

But one gets used to it, so it's quite all right. Anyway, we're still on the first one, so let's do some other ones, shall we? Now, the good mind can also go to a neutral mind, a defiled neutral mind of the kamadhatu, and it can also go to an undefiled neutral mind of the kamadhatu. A good mind can do that. Any problem with that or questions about how it does that? Or an example of that? Can somebody get an example of how a good mind can be followed by a neutral mind? Yes? Bodhisattva vowed to not leave, for instance, to cause it to... Birth consciousness isn't retribution, though.

[44:09]

Birth consciousness is itself a defiled state. It's a defiled state. It could be defiled neutral. But it's not retribution. What follows birth consciousness is retribution. The destiny is retribution. No, it's birth consciousness, then the destiny. Well, it's maybe too trivial for you to think of an example. Yes? Yeah. Right. So you have a moment of good consciousness, of faith and concentration, and the next moment's blue.

[45:09]

That's all. That's undefiled neutral. Perhaps. Or the next moment could be... a defiled neutral, which could be a state of, for example, some mild agitation or something, uneasiness, but not, you know, you're just sort of sitting there being agitated, but it's not like agitation at the level that you yourself would feel was really unwholesome. You yourself wouldn't feel it's unwholesome. You'd think it was kind of like well I'm not a bad I'm a kind of a good Buddhist and yet I'm a little agitated and it's not bothering anybody else you're not breaking any precepts or anything just a moment not so difficult to see and if you can and not so difficult to see how it would be caused either okay any questions about that

[46:18]

Now good of the kamadhatu can lead to good of the rupadhatu. Is that clear how you do that, how that happens? Yes. Is there some problem with that? No.

[47:25]

What? I don't know. So what you're talking about is you're doing this meditation in the kamadhatu, all right? You're doing a... You're trying to do the trance meditation. You're in the kamadhatu, and that's... To try to do it, at a certain level, your trying will actually become good karma. Like some people try to do trances... in the kamadhatu, but actually they're robbing gas stations when they're doing it. So they're not really that concentrated. They sort of think they are, but really they're quite confused and it's not, strictly speaking, the actual good attempt to do so in the kamadhatu. And at a certain point they get really good at it and they are then doing it in the rupadhatu. They're actually now doing the trance. They've attained They've actually attained the trance, but you're still doing it. But now you're doing it in Akham Rupadattu. You've attained the trance.

[48:26]

You're doing it perfectly. Totally zeroed in on the object of meditation. You're as concentrated as you want to be. You can just stay right with it. And that would be a state where actually if you were meditating on something, all the other objects wouldn't be impinging on you at that time. You actually would be cutting them out. That's why the full attainment of the trance is not like zazen, where in zazen you can still see people walking by in the zendo or hear the buses or something. If you're meditating on Something that's not a bus, you don't hear a bus anymore when you enter the Rinpoche. Trance. Okay? A blue disc is one of them.

[49:28]

So you meditate on a blue disc. When you attain the trance, that's all you're doing. If you want to. Now, it's also possible to attain that level of concentration. And once you attain that, you can say, well, I'm going to switch to a white disc. Once you can concentrate like that, you can do whatever you want. Now, in order to do Mahayana Buddhist meditation, you do not have to enter into that trance where you only see a blue disc, but you have to be able to do that. You have to have that level of concentration in order to really be able to do insight practice, because when you do insight practice, you'd have to be able to zero in on the practice clearly. So in the Mahayana meditation, you have to be as good, have that level of concentration without necessarily taking the taking the jhana. You can take the jhana too, but you don't have to. So you can come up to that level of concentration, which is called anagamya, which means potential.

[50:30]

In other words, you have the potential to enter the jhana, wherein you could cut out all the things in the meditation object. But you can also go into meditation, contemplation, higher contemplation, where you won't enter the jhana, you'll stay in the kama dhattu, but you apply that level of concentration to some insight practice. So the level of concentration that's required for the transits is also required for the higher levels of insight practices in Mahayana Buddhism, also in Hinayana Buddhism, if you want to do that. Instead of going over, like, instead of So I shouldn't say Mahayana, it's Mahayana and Hinayana insight practices. So these calming practices, if you then go into the, for example, the practices of the four foundations of mindfulness, in order to do those properly, you have to have attained the, in order to do them fully, you have to have attained the Anilomya, Anagamya.

[51:36]

Aniloma means continuity. Anagamya. So at the state of doing the foundations of mindfulness fully, you should be able to switch over to do the trances if you wanted to. But you may not want to since they're just further karma. Perhaps if you want to, do it just for the trip. So you can switch over into the insight practices after you've attained that level of concentration. Now, once you have attained the trance, which this is the route we're taking here, of going from the kamadhatu to the rupadhatu first dhyana, if you stay in that dhyana, that dhyana will, if you look over to rupadhatu, okay, rupadhatu ke, see, and rupadhatu kushala, the next karaka, As for the minds of the rupadhatu, after kushala, eleven.

[52:44]

So it says, after kushala, wait a second. Okay. Immediately after kushala, the good mind of the rupadhatu, there can arise eleven minds. So accepting the avyakrita of the rupadhatu, avrupadhatu. Yeah, it should be Arupyadatu. 68C... 68C, 69D, number one. Okay? Immediately after the Kushala, good mind of the Rupadatu, there can arise 11 minds. In other words, all the minds can arise after that except for one. All right? So if you watch this, see, this chart's pretty good. If you make this chart and understand this chart, you'll understand a lot of what you've learned so far.

[53:51]

So I'll just do part of the chart right now. So we've been talking about K, kushala, to kushala, to akushala, to nirita avyakrita, and to anirita avyakrita, okay? And it can go to all of these, all right? We just talked about how it can go to all of those. Is that clear? Now, we just talked about, now here's, this is common doctor. Now, group doctor. And rupa, they break up into just, in this chart, we're just breaking up into three parts. So in here is the kushula, OK? And this kushula, as you know, has four layers. One, two, three, four. All right?

[54:53]

These are the four transits. These are four actual phoba, you know, really just really working at the trance. You're working, you're doing good, you're trying to do this dhyana practice, OK? We're just talking about the first one for now, but it's the same for the other one. Except that you can't go directly from, you can't go directly from Kushala, the Kamadatu, to the fourth Rupajana. You have to go to the first Rupajana. And then from the first Rupajana, you go to the second, and then you go to the third and the fourth. So actually, this only applies, this chart only applies to the first. This is Kamadatu up here. You can only go from the Kamadatu to the first. In order to go to the second, you have to go from rupadhatu kushala. This is rupana. This is karma and this is rupa.

[55:57]

Rupadhatu kushala. So here's the rupadhatu jhana. You can go from the rupadhatu jhana and you can go to this, [...] and this. In other words, you can go to a moment of jhana, of concentration, in the rupadatu, to a moment of concentration in the rupadatu. In other words, you can keep it up for a while. You can go from a moment of trying to do the trance, of being pretty good at the trance, but not yet attaining it, which is called access to the trance, which is kutula kamadatra, you can go to the first rupajana. OK? But to go to the second rupajana, what you have to do is go over to the first rupajana, and then go from the first rupajana to another rupajana of a higher level.

[57:04]

You go from there up to here. Now, notice that you can do this, you can do this, but you can't do this. You can't go from the kamadhatu to the anivritta avyakuta of the rupadhatu. You can't go from the kamadhatu good attempting, trying to do the trance, but not yet attaining. You can't go from there to the undefiled neutral of the rupadhatu. Why can't you do it? No. Yes. What's a default state? No. That's not the reason. Go on. No. OK, you're not getting it.

[58:07]

Okay, now I take a hint. What is this? 25,000 neutral, but what is it? It's a destiny. What destiny is it? The important thing is it's a destiny. Now that you know that's an important point, what destiny is it? What? It's reproductive, but what destiny? What is it? What kind of destiny? It's a heaven. And which heaven is it? It's the first Rupajana heaven. There's three of them. They're called Brahman heaven. They're heavens of Brahman. There's three levels. One first level is just the regular citizens of the Brahman heaven. Then there's the attendance of Brahman and the Brahman himself. So those are three different kinds of heavens you can go into. From what? Not from here. Not from here, right?

[59:09]

I just told you, it can't go like this. That's why there's X here. Where do you go from? What? What? No. What? See, this destiny is retribution for this. Not for this. This here is you can do this, you can do this kind of karma. This karma is not retribution from this kind of karma. Being able to do the trance isn't retribution from doing the trance in the reproductive is not retribution from doing the trance in the common doctor. The full trance isn't retribution from the access trance or the near trance. Why isn't it retribution? What? No? What's the relationship between this dharma... What's the relationship between the karmic quality of this dharma and the karmic quality of this dharma if this is retribution of this?

[60:25]

What's the relationship? What? What? What's the relationship between the karmic quality of this and the karmic quality of this? They're different. They're different. They're not the same. Okay? If this is good, and this is good, then this can't be retribution from this. So you can't, if you have a good access meditation in the Kama Datu, and you have a good full trance in the Rupa Datu, then this can't be retribution from this. See? It's not retribution, but obviously this is leading up to this. So we call that nishanda. They're similar, you see. Because you do this practice, this finally can lead to this practice. That's where the word analoma comes in. This practice, you develop a kind of continuity between this state in the kamadhatu and this state in the rupadhatu.

[61:33]

This state is very similar to this one, but it's just not completely absorbed into the trance. And at a certain point, if you get so similar, and when you attain the full access, you could attain this state or not, depending on whether you want to. And this fully developed potential in the kamadhatu, you could then turn to inside practices, or if you keep it up, you'll attain this continuity knowledge, a continuity trance, and then at a certain point, you have a thing called gotrabhu. You break the lineage of the kamadhatu, and you flip over into the rupadhatu. and you break the lineage. In other words, no more kamadhatu for a while. You actually cut off from it and you're in the rupadhatu. You change worlds because you wanted to. Now, the anivritta is a different karmic quality from the kamadhatu. So that's why you might think, well, maybe this could produce this as a vipaka.

[62:37]

But it can't, because what this is a vipaka, what this is retribution of, is the trance in the same dhatu. Because it's from the rupadhatu meditation fully attained in the rupadhatu that you project yourself into the rupadhatu heaven, which is undefiled neutral. So that's why in this, if you look from here, of the kushula of the rupadatta, at least at this, [...] and this. So that's why this is filled in under the rupadatta. So if you remember these two, you remember the nature of the trance, entering the trance, and and what the trance really is, namely that the trance isn't the heaven, and what the heaven is, and the heaven isn't produced by the access trance, but produced by the full trance. So these little boxes are two important boxes.

[63:39]

Now, the next thing you learn under this heading is that also for the Arupidatu, you have the same thing. You see, you have check, check, and no check. See, there's not a check here. That's the one that you can't do. So you can do 11. So following the kama dattu, the kushala of the rupa dattu, you can have 11 because you can't have this one for the same reasons that you couldn't have this one. This is the destiny from doing the arupya dattu trance. You can only get into this heaven when you actually fully attain the arupya jhana type of trance. And there you can have this. OK. OK, now maybe go back to the rest of this column.

[64:42]

Yes? Is undefiled neutral always retribution? Undefiled neutral is always retribution? No, not always. Retribution is always undefiled neutral. Is retribution always undefiled neutral? I think so. I don't... Let's see, is undefiled neutral always retribution? I don't think so. You see, undefiled neutral will be a state of consciousness that's neutral and just doesn't have any defilement in it. And... It should be possible to have that happen besides from previous karma. See if I can think of an example. If you can only get to a neutral state in reproductive, if it's the destiny.

[65:47]

If you can only get to neutral, if it's a destiny. Then it sounds like neutral has to be a destiny. Oh, I see. Well, maybe here, maybe here it's a destiny only. But maybe here it isn't. But that's a good point. If you can only get here, if you can't get here, except as a destiny. If I say it's a destiny here, but here it may not be a destiny. Now, is there anything in the, is there any state in the, see, to be just, When you're a human being, when you choose birth in the human realm, part of your time is spent in your destiny. You're just sitting there, just being a human. You're not doing good or bad karma. You're just in the human condition. And you're not wiggling to get away from it. You're just sort of... You're the essence of human, of humanness for a while then. And you're in the destiny and that's undefiled, neutral, and that's the destiny.

[66:51]

Now, is there anything else that could be said to be undefiled neutral that wouldn't be the destiny? Well, for the sake of not spending the rest of the class, me sitting here thinking about whether I can think of something else, let's say maybe for now I can't think of anything else. So maybe that's right.

[67:52]

Maybe when you're just sort of there, and you're not really whomping up any good or bad karma, and you're not even sort of trying to a little bit, but not quite succeeding at it, which is defiled neutral, Maybe that's just a human situation that you chose birth in. And you come up with experiences like that. They arise because of your choice to be born. It's just your destiny. And so maybe somebody could try to think of some other way that we could. For example, just abiding in the functioning of your consciousness without some great, but without sort of a great concentration and not abiding, you know, like if you're thoroughly examining the nature of your consciousness, you convert, you convert it to wholesome karma if it has certain marks.

[69:00]

But if you're just sort of hanging out there but you're not particularly aware of it, you know, but your mind just sort of going along, working away, heart's beating, everything, just your human situation is functioning and you're not doing anything about it one way or another. That's human life. And it's out of that that we decide to make more of it. And it's when you're in the undefiled, neutral part of the destiny, you're a lot like you are in the antarabhava, when you're uncommitted. So, maybe you're right. For now, anyway, I'd rather than come to a definitive agreement with that, say that it sounds pretty good. Especially since Abhidham Akosha says, as she said, that you can't do this. Because, and also you won't be able to do these either. Oh no, you can do one of them, excuse me. You can do this one.

[70:05]

Another one. You can go to the defiled neutral of the arupyadatu from the kamadatu kushila. Was there some questions? Someone raised their hand. Yes? Yes. The human is womb-born. Animal is womb-born. Egg-borne is animal. Hell and I think heaven and hell are, you know, mind-borne or transformation-borne. What do they call it? What? Miraculous birth. And moisture-borne is also animal.

[71:08]

The destinies, yeah. Destinies have to do with... those births will correspond to the different destinies. Okay. So, two minutes. Yes? It says, a question... Well, first do the nivrita avyakrita of the rupadatta, okay? when the ascetic enters into absorption when the man who dies in the kamadhatu with a good mind passes into intermediate existence of the rupadhatu so this says you're in the kamadhatu, alright and you have a good mind and And you pass into the intermediate existence after your death of the rupadhatu.

[72:24]

You're in the bardo existence in the rupadhatu now. But one of the things that happens to you in death often is that because Because your body goes flat on you, it may be that a lot of your habits, even your good habits, are somewhat dependent on the body working for you. And you just sort of become flat and lose your tone. It's hard for you to kind of make a kind of effort. So the person who doesn't have good habits, even though at the moment they die, They're creating good karma. Unless their habits are quite strong, when the body goes away, what they're using for that good karma, it's hard for them to keep it up. So the body goes flat and their habits become very strong. And if they get born in the rupadattu, the undefiled quality of their habits...

[73:30]

gives birth. So the way they get in the rupadhatu is by dying going to the intermediate existence of the rupadhatu. So intermediate existence can be in rupadhatu. So you can be between destinies in the rupadhatu. But if you die and you have certain bad habits as you go into the intermediate existence there will be this defiled quality will accrue now in a mind of the Aripadhatu Nivritta when Nivritta of Yakuta when the dying in the Kamadhatu is reborn in Aripadhatu not Kushala For the Haripi Dattu being estranged from the Kama Dattu by the four estrangements, one cannot pass directly from the Kama Dattu into the absorption of the Rupa Dattu.

[74:45]

You have to go Kama Dattu, first Rupa Dattu, first Rupa Dattu, second Rupa Dattu, from the second Rupa Dattu to the third Rupa Dattu, from the third Rupa Dattu to the fourth Rupa Dattu to the first Haripi Dattu. So these four estrangements are ashraya, alambana, pratipaksha, and akhara. So ashraya is the, anyway, there's these four estrangements. These four ways that the person in the kamadhatu is estranged from the arupadhatu. And because of this considerable estrangement, The person in the Kama Dattu cannot make a similar enough mind to make the leap. They have to go through the Rupa Dattu to get to the Arupadattu. In the Rupa Dattu you can create a mind that is like the Arupadattu and you can enter the Arupadattu by the trance, by the good karma.

[75:57]

Here it says that it's the same entry. So, you die, you go to the death consciousness, you go to the intermediate existence, And then from the intermediate existence, you go into the rupadhatu, but the rupadhatu then being defiled. And you can also go into intermediate state and go into arupadhatu, also defiled. But you can't get into the good, because the good is only produced by the trance. And you can't get into the retributive section, because that's only produced by the trance also. So these two ones that are maybe difficult for you to understand have to do with studying the rebirth process as it's involved with the intermediate existence, which is studied in Chapter 3, as you see there.

[77:09]

Chapter 3, Kargat 38. What? Four estrangements are Asraya, A-S with a slash, R-A-Y-A, Alambana, A-L-A-M-B-A-N-A, Pratipaksha, P-R-A-T-I-P-A, P-A-K-S with a dial under A, and Akhara, oh, it's Pratipaksha Durata, D-U-R-A-T-A, and akara, A long A, K long A, R A. So these are the four estrangements of the rupadhatu. Asraya is the persons of the rupadhatu are not able to render present to themselves, assimilate to themselves, any dharma of the kamadhatu, whereas the beings of the rupadhatu

[78:19]

can render present and assimilate themselves of the thought of creation of the kamadhatu, which is called nirmanacitta. So if you're in the Kama Dattu, and you're in the Rupa Dattu, there's a kind of thought that you can create, which is like a thought that's of the Kama Dattu. It's a nirmanacitta. It's a kind of a created citta, a visualized citta. When you're in the Rupa Dattu, you can visualize that. No, Rupa Dattu. In rupadattu you can make a picture, in other words, a picture consciousness, which is like a picture consciousness that can be created in the kamadattu. So the rupadattu can look back to the kamadattu by this nirmanacitta. And that's how If you'll look at this column here, you'll notice that these guys in the rupadapti can go back to the kamadapti.

[79:29]

One of the ways they get back is through this nirmanacitta. One of the ways you can come down from these trances is by thinking a certain kind of image. of your old home, and you can come back that way. So they're not estranged in that way. There's some kind of shared space. So that's how you can go from the kamadhatu. That's one of the ways to explain how you can go from kamadhatu to rupadhatu. But in the arupadhatu, there's no way to think of anything in the kamadhatu. There's just the astraya, you know. It's just the field. You just can't think of anything. And this nirmanacitta is discussed in Karaka 53 of this chapter, 53b. The thought of the domain of the rupadhatu does not apply to the kamadhatu categories of gross and so on.

[80:32]

And that's discussed in chapter 6, Karaka 49. As does the thought of the domain of the rupadhatu. The thought of the domain of the rupadhatu can share can discuss some of the categories or be concerned with some of the categories of gross, for example, that are in the Kamadatu. And likewise, it does not know about the objects of the Kamadatu because Rupadatu and Kamadatu, at least there's still some form. One's refined form and the other's subtle form. I mean, one's refined form and the other's gross, but the gross includes the subtle. So the people who can see the subtle can still see the gross. But the people who see no form can't see the subtle or the gross. And likewise, it does not oppose itself to the passions of the kamadhatu as do the dhyanas. So the dhyanas actually, you get in the dhyanas by suppressing passions for the realm of the kamadhatu.

[81:37]

So it's by turning away from the five sense objects and putting them down. That's one of the devices you use to get yourself interested in the rupadhatu. So the rupadhatu, its point of departure, or bouncing board, is the kamadhatu. Whereas you don't get any arupadhatu by bouncing off the kamadhatu. You don't bounce off the rupadhatu either. You bounce off of certain ways of thinking, like the infinity of space or so on. So that's the first changement, and that's why Kamandatu and the Arupadatu are so far away that you can't go into the Arupadatu trance directly from the Kamandatu. But you can get into the Arupadatu by dying. Greediest one first.

[82:46]

... [...] After you've gone through the jhanas once, you can go through them so fast the next time that it's almost like you're jumping. But you're still going through them. So first time you go, you go, work real hard to get up here in the first group of jhana, and you go up second, third, fourth, then you go up into the outer jhana, then you go second, third, fourth, then you go up into the outer jhana. After a while, it's almost like... So Buddha, the Buddha just, the Buddha just thinks of the top of the Aripadhatu, which is the Neuroda Somapati, just sort of thinks.

[83:53]

Neuroda Somapati, that's it. There's no more Neuroda Somapati to Buddha than just sort of thinking about it. Just mind and mental states don't exist, okay? That's it. I mean, not that they don't exist, but mind and mental states, off. And that's the difference between the Buddha and the other Aryans, or Arhats, that the other Aryans, even when they have been up there several times, they still have to sort of go... But it's just like, it's kind of like a jump, you know, sort of... But Buddha just goes, huh? And he's there. So Buddha is totally, the enlightened mind is totally sees that something is just what you think it is. I mean, that's just it. And there's no space between. But for these, to really do this intergalactic travel, the less than enlightened mind sort of has to sort of say, traveling this long distance, I still have to sort of notice that I'm going by Mars and Pluto and still have to sort of

[85:09]

You still sort of, because you're passing through all these realms, you still sort of feel like it's taking a while. It's just there. That's all you're thinking of, so there's no space in between. Like this. See, ordinary person saw a trail behind my hand, sees a trail. But actually, there's just Buddha doesn't see any trail. That's imputed by somebody, I don't know, who did that. OK, so that's the first column. All right? Do you want to do any more columns, or do you want to go to chapter 3? OK, so I don't know. I don't think we want to have to do. We've just done one vertical column. So basically, there's 24 columns to do. So we could do a few more columns if you want.

[86:11]

Some of them are more empty than others. We actually sort of did two columns now. We did the kushala of the kamadhatu completely. And we did the kushala of the rupadhatu partly. And the other ones may not take so. The next three are pretty simple. And then some of the horizontal ones are interesting. So do you want to spend another week on discussing this chart and how to use it? And then maybe if you want to spend one more week, then we can just do one more and see next week. And then next week you decide whether you want to go on to chapter three or not. Do you have chapter three? No. Are there chapter threes? They're coming along? So if you want to chapter 3, which is... What?

[87:13]

A show of hands? Sixteen, some people aren't here.

[87:29]

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