Yes? Hi. Hi. Could you explain why you ring the bell at certain times during the Chanting of the Scripture? It's mainly tradition. It's just the places that in the Scripture book it says to ring the bell. Yes? Yes? Yes? Why is it that it's chanting rather than just read aloud the way word punctuation? Well, one of the... One of the characteristics or virtues of chanting it is that there's, you know, especially when you do it in a group, that it's like it has one tone that goes straight through from beginning to end so that it doesn't keep, you know, the tone, the chanting just keeps stopping.

[01:05]

So stopping at the punctuation, there isn't the feeling of continuous sound going on from beginning to end. There's nothing wrong with that, to stop and have those breaks. It's perfectly fine. It's just that it's not so much connected to the body that way. Just like when you sing, when people sing, it's more of a full-bodied experience for most people. Now, some people can read, professional actors or something, can read lines with punctuation, and, you know, it's really their whole body's in it because they're speaking like ordinary people. They're trying to imitate ordinary speech, which has people stop at periods and stuff like that. Whereas in opera or singing, they're not trying to sound like ordinary speech. They're trying to be this kind of sound source to move us by the music.

[02:15]

Also, if we chant in a group that way and we don't stop at the periods and commas, you can also chant until you run out of air rather than stopping to breathe just because the sentence is over. So you can get in touch with how much, you know, with what's going on with your breathing. So you inhale and you generally speak and chant until you kind of like come to the end of your air. which allows you to take a deeper breath. Again, if you listen to opera singers or something, or even other kinds of singers, they're usually speaking in relationship to their breathing. I mean, they're, you know what I mean? They're not just, there's that relationship, so you have that, it's more physical. I could go on, but that's some of the reasons for chanting rather than just reading.

[03:20]

And also, if we did this for a while, you would get quite a different feeling from hearing people chant than people recite. Is it now to kind of quiet and focus? Is that why? Why? Well, you can also quiet and focus by reading. both reading with your eyes and reading out loud, stopping at the... Because there's concentration of paying attention to the words. So just reading will also concentrate. It's just a more full-bodied... Oops. Thank you. It's just a more full-bodied experience, I think, when you sing something than, generally speaking, when you read it. And... If you listen to people chant in a foreign language, it can be very meaningful.

[04:30]

But to listen to them read in a foreign language, you know, it's less likely to be meaningful. But the meaning is not in terms of the linguistic impact. It's the sound. You can feel the people's body. You can feel their breathing. And you can synchronize your body with them because they're showing you their breadth. But this isn't to put down reading it, it's just to give an experience of chanting. Yes. I have a follow-up question to that.

[05:32]

I was raised a Catholic and became a Presbyterian. And currently, I'm not much of anything in terms of active participation in the Church. I still support the Church. You were raised a Catholic. Pardon? I say that chanting... and the Christ have a heart of true wisdom. Yes. Feel the sounds like dogma. Dogma of religion. And is that true or not true or partially true? What do you mean by dogma? Dogma is something that is put forth that all true believers, each of them, adhere to?

[06:34]

Adhere to? Well, I don't know if... I don't think that Buddha's teachings are put forth as something you I don't know. I don't know if I can say that I don't feel that what's being put forth is something you had to adhere to. But maybe you do have to adhere to it. I'm not sure. But the fact that I'm not sure gives you a feeling about, you know... What does that mean? What does what mean? Pardon? What does that mean? What does what mean? That you're not sure what dogma is. Well, I think it means that I'm not telling you that it isn't dogma, or that it is. I see. I think that what I'm about to say to you could be... I could say it like I could say the Buddha said...

[07:52]

the following, or a scholar would say, Buddhists say the following. A non-believer might say, Buddhists say this. And a Buddhist might say, Buddhists said this. Or what I often say is, I have heard that Buddhists said this. And what I've heard that Buddha said is that all Buddhas appear in the world because of one great condition, and that is that they wish beings to open to and see a demonstration of and awaken to and enter into perfect wisdom so i've heard that that's what buddhas wish and i'm saying that to you now in words that you can hear in english that you can understand somewhat and that gives you an opportunity to consider

[09:23]

whether that seems to be in accord with what is most important in your life. I'm not exactly saying you must adhere to and accept what I just said in order to be a Buddhist. But maybe, you know, Maybe you do have to in order to be a Buddhist, but you may not necessarily need to be a Buddhist in order to become a Buddha. I'm not sure. In order to wish all beings to be without suffering. Yeah, you wouldn't necessarily need to be a Buddhist to wish all beings to be free of suffering. And you wouldn't necessarily need to be a Buddhist in order to actually wish to practice and live in such a way that you could do, that you could live a life that would be conducive to all beings being free of suffering.

[10:34]

You wouldn't necessarily have to be a Buddhist to do that. So that's why I started by saying, please consider if you wish to, if you wish what you really wish most in life and Does that correspond to wishing that you would be able to be optimally beneficial to beings? Which would mean that you would have all impediments to being beneficial would be dropped away and all faculties and felicities to working for the benefit of beings would be manifested in your life. Would you wish that? Is that by any chance what is most important to you in this life? If it is, then in a sense what you wish is what some people call a Buddha.

[11:35]

That's what we mean by a Buddha, someone who has no problems helping people doesn't mean the buddhas can enlighten everybody completely immediately because obviously that hasn't been achieved yet but would you want to be and live in that way would you want to be that way and live that way and if so then you may have some interest in the teachings which would help you realize that state. And these teachings are specifically related to helping ordinary human beings, specifically for ordinary human beings who do have some kind of hindrance to helping people, some kind of unskillfulness in terms of helping people, and also have some skills that they haven't yet learned, which they could learn if they developed more wisdom, more perfect wisdom.

[12:49]

So then... And maybe you need it means you feel that the life you want to live needs it. The way you want to live needs it. And this sutra says that when you have wisdom, you know, when obstructions to wisdom have been removed, there's no fear. So one of the main things that some of us would like to be able to give, some of us would like to be unafraid of old age sickness and death. We'd like to be both our own old age sickness and death and other people's old age sickness and death. Some of us would like to be unafraid of that. proposal here is that with wisdom and compassion we can be free of fear of any manifestation of life and death and so now you don't necessarily have to like take that

[14:16]

as true, but just hear that this is what the scripture is saying. And think about and meditate on whether that makes sense to you. That would be wonderful. It would be wonderful, yeah. Everybody is not afraid of living or dying and the fullest way they can. So our present situation is we have all these wars now because there's so much fear generated in our lives together. And when people are afraid, you can get them to do almost anything. Well, you know, in the central, we have seen things that people have done when they're afraid. You can both get people to... not protect themselves and also you can get people to harm other people in unbelievably horrible ways if they're afraid of what will happen to them if they don't follow the orders to hurt these people who are and the people are giving them the orders are people who are afraid of these people and some people don't want to hurt them and aren't so afraid of the people are afraid of the people who are afraid of the people and

[15:33]

So now in America, a lot of people are afraid of the people who are afraid because they're afraid of what the people who are afraid will do to you if you don't go along with what they're doing to the people they're afraid of. So we have all this fear. So with this fear, it's hard for us to function in a helpful way. This sutra is saying that this wisdom, when you remove these obstructions, there's no fear. Now, I guess the question is, is it worth a try to try to develop the wisdom just to find out if it really works that well to have wisdom? And so if you give it a try, then in some sense you have some faith. First of all, you have faith in what you think is good, but that isn't because the Buddhist told you what was good. They didn't exactly force you to think that wisdom would be good and fearlessness would be good.

[16:37]

But it may be that you weren't so clear before how important wisdom and fearlessness was. And then the Buddhist scripture tells you, you go, yeah. It's just sort of accords with your inner, your deep inner wish anyway. But sometimes you didn't notice it before somebody said it to you. And if you believe that, it isn't that you had to believe it, it's just that it does accord with something deep in you. So in a sense, then you have faith in that teaching, but really it's that the teaching accorded with what's most important to you in the first place. But this scripture is offered as something for you to be devoted to. The scripture is not what do you call it? It's not put in, it's not the whole story on how to realize the perfect wisdom that it's talking about. It's telling you about perfect wisdom, but it's not really like reasoning with you.

[17:45]

The reasoning with you is what, if you'll excuse me for saying so, this class is for. This class is for you to bring up your doubts and questions and examine these teachings until you actually become actually sure for yourself, not because it says so, but sure about the teaching of emptiness and about actually sure and certain that phenomena are empty. The sutra tells you that they are, just to give you a starting point. So once it tells you that everything's empty, but now in this class we can discuss what does that mean? Do you understand that? And can you recognize that actually you don't agree with that teaching? So part of what's going on here is that we have a class in wisdom for people who need more wisdom, which means we have a class

[18:51]

which is going to potentially overthrow the way you think things are. So there's going to be some, what do you call it, some interaction there between the way you see things now and the way you're being told things actually are. And it isn't that you're supposed to just say, I hear that things are empty. I accept that this is being said, that things are empty, but I also notice that I don't think they are. And so make a case for the way you think things are and we can reason with each other about this until we can actually understand and be sure that things are empty of inherent existence.

[20:02]

Yes? So I have a question about emptiness. What I wrote down that you said a couple weeks ago was that emptiness itself is not impermanent like that it is permanent. And so I was trying to I understand how emptiness is permanent. And I guess what I was thinking about is for something to be impermanent, there's a change, a change quality, that something changes. And with emptiness, it's not a thing, so... Emptiness is a thing. It's a phenomenon. It's not just a dream. And it is an object. It can be an object. It's something you can know, like the color of the sky. Emptiness can be known. As a perception. You can have a perception of emptiness and you can have a conception of emptiness, both.

[21:07]

But you had it before that emptiness doesn't exactly change. Emptiness is just the way things always are. Whenever anything's happening, They always lack inherent existence. So they're always that way, and that way that they are doesn't change. However, emptiness is permanent, but it doesn't last. Okay? It's more like it's eternal. It's not a matter of duration. So whenever anything happens, its emptiness is there. And whenever anything ceases, its emptiness ceases. So emptiness doesn't last... The emptiness of you and me doesn't last after we change. But even though the emptiness doesn't exist separate from impermanent phenomena, it itself is not impermanent. Because it's not composed...

[22:09]

the way impermanent things are composed. It dependently co-arises, but it's not compounded. You said it's not composed. It's not composed, it's not compounded. It doesn't depend on a bunch of different conditions. So all emptinesses, although they're not the same, because each emptiness is the emptiness of something, so in a sense you have different emptinesses. So the emptiness of Vera is different from the emptiness of Diego. And the emptiness of each one of them arises with them and ceases with them. But it's always the same way. It's always the simple lack of inherent existence. So in that way, it's permanent. It's always the same. It's always one taste. Everything has the same taste. So in that sense, it's permanent. And another example of something permanent is space.

[23:14]

But like space is always there, so it doesn't cease. I don't understand how emptiness ceases. Well, emptiness ceases because emptiness is not something, lack of inherent existence is a lack of inherent existence of things that exist dependently. So again, emptiness is not floating around just the lack of existence apart from dependency. It's the lack of existence of things that do exist dependently. So when things that exist dependently arise, they always have emptiness. And when they cease, there's no emptiness lingering. That's what the first part of the sutra is talking about, though, when it says, form does not differ from emptiness, emptiness does not differ from form. However, Form is a composed phenomena, and when the things it depends on change, it ceases.

[24:31]

Whereas emptiness ceases not because its composite parts change, it ceases because the phenomena it's the emptiness of ceases. So it's permanent but doesn't last. The idea of permanence as something that lasts doesn't apply to emptiness either. Doesn't that make emptiness dependent on things that arise and cease? Emptiness is dependent on things that arise and cease because emptiness is about things that arise and cease. Emptiness is the way transient things really are. And the way transient things are is that they lack independent existence.

[25:37]

That's the way they really are. And the way they exist is they exist in dependence on conditions and mental imputation. That's the way they exist. And things do exist that way. Can you give an example of that form? Last few weeks we've seen the form as an example a lot. A feeling? Yeah, sensations or perceptions or emotions. I'm going to have a harder time. Well, you can have perceptions of a form, and you can have perceptions of a feeling, but you can also just say a feeling. In other words, a feeling that you're feeling, a feeling that you're conscious of. So if the feelings you have are empty of inherent existence, I mean, I understand how your feelings are dependent on a lot of different things, but it doesn't make them less real, right? It doesn't make them less real that they depend on things?

[26:41]

That you are having them and that they're affecting how you behave and exist in the world. It doesn't make them less real that they depend on things? No, it doesn't make them less real. It makes... It lets them be... They arise in dependence on things, okay? Feelings arise in dependence on conditions and mental imputation. Okay? That fact doesn't make feeling any less real than feelings are. But feelings aren't more real than that. In other words, feelings aren't so real that they don't even need their conditions. In other words, they're so bossy and so real that they don't even need the conditions for for feelings. They don't need to meet the conditions for feelings, the criteria and the qualities of feelings, and also they don't need mental imputation. That would be more real than they are. Now, if you think that feelings have inherent existence, then if you hear about them depending on conditions, you might feel like they're a little less real than you thought so.

[27:51]

If you exaggerate their reality or exaggerate their existence, then if you hear that they depend on conditions, you might feel their level, their exaggerated reality might feel eroded. The virtue of talking about forms colors, sounds, smells, tastes, and tangibles, is that they're related to the body. The body is composed of these, and we also then convert these physical elements into a concept of a body. The body is just a concept. It's actually composed of sense data which come in these five categories.

[28:53]

The advantage of talking about forms is that those are the ones that we most, when it comes to our body, that's where we most exaggerate the existence of it. We have a little bit of better sense that feelings and opinions are somewhat transitory We have a better sense of that. We can sense they're changing a little faster than we can sense our body does. So when it comes to our body, that's where we have the most exaggerated sense of substantial existence. Our body and also other physical things like walls and stuff. We kind of think we can walk through feelings, but we don't think we can walk through walls. And there's reasons, many reasons, conditions for why we don't think we can walk through walls. But still, even though I said that, still, feelings are empty too. And if we stop exaggerating the reality or the level of existence of feelings, that changes the way we relate to our feelings.

[30:00]

We start to... Our behavior changes when we start to do that. But in some ways... working with material things, it's easier to find out how we do not agree with the teaching on those examples. Our adherence to the inherent existence of material objects is more gross than our adherence to the inherent existence of our feelings and our ideas. Although we do the same with the feelings and the ideas, it's a little harder for us to catch how we project substantiality into those kinds of transient things. So we know the body changes, but we think it changes much slower than it actually changes. We know our feelings change, but we think they change faster than our body, right? Does that make sense to you? Your feelings, you can notice your feelings go from positive, from pain to pleasure.

[31:07]

You can see that happening, you know, sometimes... mom almost like second by second sometimes easily minute by minute sometimes why should i i'm not saying it's easy but maybe you can sometimes do that some people actually have trouble with that but not too many people to see their body changing moment to moment even though it does we know it does but it's hard to see it why because we project onto it inherent existence which makes us keep grasping it conceptually as same body, same body, same body, my [...] body. We keep doing that, so it kind of basically seems like it's pretty much the same body ever since we were little kids. We kind of know that something's changed, but at the same time, it's still your same body. We hear, you know, reports that that's not so, that every seven years all the cells in your body have changed.

[32:13]

You don't have any of your seven-year-ago. Nothing about your seven-year-ago body is around you right now. I'm breathing it more than you are probably. So you hear about that and how it looks. But we can talk about feelings and emotions in the same way. It's just that people are most defiant when it comes to material things. So that's why it's sometimes nice to use them. So, you know, even with advanced students, they say, well, you have a book, you know. I have a book here. They say, okay, we got this book. And we're saying that this book does exist. It exists in dependence on conditions. Certain conditions have to be satisfied for this book to be here. And mental apprehension. Mental imputation is also necessary. Just the conditions aren't enough.

[33:14]

So, for example, for a fish, there's no book here. The conditions for the book are still here. You bring a fish in here, show him the book, but the fish is not going to be a book there. Also, we look at a stream, we see a flowing stream. A fish is not in a flowing stream. A fish is in a shopping center. That's what their mind's apprehending. They're at the mall. They're at a mall. Their mind's apprehending something different. They do not apprehend books as far as we know. There's not much sign that a fish apprehends a book. Put a book in a fish tank, the fish are not going to go read it. They might bite it a little bit. They might think it's food. But then they say it's not food. Maybe they will. So maybe a shark would actually think it's food and just clomp.

[34:16]

If a shark was near a library, there'd probably be a lot of books in the shark. So what if a person hasn't been exposed to a particular thing? Say, I've never heard of... Could we talk about something we are exposed to first? Something that actually, rather than non-existent things, let's talk about these things that do exist. Like a book. A book does exist, but it needs mental imputation to exist. The conditions aren't enough for the book. But mental imputations matter not either. Like, okay, I got the idea of book, but I'm looking at you and I don't have the conditions for a book right now, so we don't say there's a book. We need the conditions for the book and mental imputation, and you've got mental imputation and the conditions, so we have a book. Now, somebody says, yeah, but if you walk out of the room, and I say, you know, that this book does not exist anywhere,

[35:24]

independent of mental imputation. So somebody says, well, if I walk out of the room and I'm not imputing the book anymore, the book's still in the room. People say that. People think that. That's an example of thinking that the book actually exists independent of mental imputation, like the book is still in the room when you walk out. The conditions for the book, you say, well, how the conditions for the book are still there. Well, No. The book has not like sort of a little bit of an existence because the conditions are there just waiting for the mental imputation to come. It has no existence, non-zero, when you take away the mental imputation. Isn't that one of the conditions? Huh? Isn't that one of the conditions? It's one of the conditions. But it's a very helpful one to notice. Because you can notice that when you walk out in the hall talking to me, you know, and I'm saying, how are you, Gary?

[36:30]

You're not imputing the book anymore. Okay? Are you? But some of the conditions for the book may still be appearing and disappearing in some other room. But there ain't no book in the room or with you. Now, If you're out in the hall with me talking and say, hey, Gary, let's think about the book, and you have the concept of the book, you don't think there's a book there. Right? You don't say, you say, well, I'm thinking of the book, but the conditions for the book are still there, so there's a book. But when you take away the mental imputation, you think the book's still there. independent of mental imputation. I shouldn't say you do, but one tends to. That's why it's very helpful to mention that one, even though it's just one of the conditions, really.

[37:31]

It's a very important one, because when the conditions are there, it takes this apprehension, it takes this grasping to draw these conditions into a unit, an entity. But with mental imputation, you can get an entity out of conditions. However, there ain't nothing more than the conditions in the imputation that make the entity. But it seems like there is. So if you imagine taking the imputation away, you'd think there's still something there. Emptiness is saying there isn't. But that's the same as saying that with mental imputation, there is. It's the same. In other words, the same as saying things do exist with it, is to say that they don't exist at all without it. If you take away some ingredients of the book, like for example, I don't know what, take away the pages, this is a book with no pages, then you say, okay, that's not a book.

[38:42]

Right? Is that okay? But that doesn't seem to shake people so much, to say, well, if you have a book with no pages, it's not a book, right? And you say, right. But if you say, if you take away your mental imputation, there's no book, they say, wait a minute, no, there's still a book there, even without my mind grasping it. You do think that, don't you? Anyway, those people at Green Gulch that have been practicing for 25 years still think that. They've been chatting their hearts out all this time, and they still think, if they got a book, and you put the book down on the table and you walk out of the room and you stop imputing it, the book's still in the room. They think that. In other words, they think that the book has an existence independent of their mental imputation. Just like they think, just like you think, if you stop thinking about me, that I keep being here. You think that, don't you? After the class is over, you think, when you stop thinking about me, that I'm still walking around someplace. Don't you? Well, it's true, I am.

[39:46]

laughter Because there's mental imputation going on because there's mental imputation That's why I still that's why I'm still walking around because I'm walking around mentally imputing myself step by step I am existing with mental imputation but if you take away my mental imputation of me and yours and Everybody else's there ain't nobody here and there ain't nobody here ain't nothing nothing however There is something because there is mental imputation so don't worry and It's just that there's nothing without it. And we think there is, don't we? And that's what you have to knock off. But you got to go over this kind of like constantly. You know, you have to do it over and over until it kind of gets constant. And when it's constant, constantly abutting this thing of, well, yeah, sure, you actually start to get convinced and you be sure.

[40:59]

And then you really... And then you can do it with your feelings and stuff like that, too. I'm just using forms, like a person's body and so on, because they're so gross that we don't believe this teaching. In other words, we do believe our inherent ignorance. We believe our ignorance. We don't believe our wisdom, which is right there, by the way. It's just that it's obscured. We're actually looking at empty things. We're actually looking at things that lack inherent existence. We're not looking at nothing. We're looking at things that exist but without inherent existence. We're looking at them all day long. We're working on them all day long. This is our life. That's our wisdom that's doing that. Our wisdom is actually functioning nicely. It's just that it's getting knocked out of shape by our delusion, our ignorance, which is we're ignoring how that's happening. We don't agree with our wisdom. Sonia?

[42:01]

Or Sonia? I guess my question is something about collective, is there a collective mental invitation? Or is it just my computation? It sounds somewhat for me that with my mental invitation and the correct conditions I've got right now, I've got to go and identify. Somehow I feel it. Right. If somebody else is mentally imputing the book, then the book does exist with that mental imputation. But for you, it does not. But even if there is nobody in the room imputing book to this book, Even if there's nobody in here, most of us think it's still here.

[43:02]

We think the yoga room's still here when we all leave. If one of us leaves, we think the other people are probably imputing it, so they probably still think the yoga room's there. But the yoga room does exist with imputation. It does exist that way. We're not saying that. We're just saying... it doesn't exist without the imputation. So that's what the sutra is saying when it says, no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body. It's saying that there's none of these things in emptiness. And emptiness is lack of inherent existence, which means also take away the mental imputation and there's no existence of these things. And take away the imputation of inherent existence and things still exist. So it's not really saying that these things don't exist when you take away the imputation of inherent existence.

[44:10]

It's saying these things don't exist when you take away mental imputation. And taking away mental imputation is taking away the existence of the thing. Do we? Yes, we do. And it works pretty well. The only problem is that we think that they exist independent of our mental imputation. We use our mental imputation to use the library and to order our dinner. And it works quite nicely. The problem is that we imagine that the dinner has an existence independent of our mental imputation and some independent of the conditions it depends on for its existence.

[45:18]

We imagine that. And that's the way it looks to us. That's the way things look to us, especially our bodies look that way. And I think you can make a lot of good theories. I know I shouldn't say a lot of good theories, but you can make a lot of theories that are quite interesting about how animals have evolved to use this imagination to overpower those who do not have this imagination. Because you can really freak out in a high-energy way with this kind of delusion. so in some sense in terms of overpowering other beings it helps to be deluded power goes nicely with delusion power goes badly with love love goes nicely with wisdom love does not go with overpowering others other animals of your same species or other species

[46:26]

Wisdom makes you not so much into power and dominance. So those who are into power and dominance tend to dominate and get more food, land, and reproductive opportunities. Nice girls finish last. They're peaceful and loving but no babies. Yes? and he sees books and things, but he lives in another mode simultaneously where he sees that there's a conventional way of seeing things, but he sees emptiness of this conventional world, therefore... Yeah.

[47:42]

doesn't quite know what it's going to be doing. Well, he kind of, no, she does know, she, by the way, she does know what's going on, but it's still surprising. Like, when she's looking at a form, then she sees its emptiness, and it's kind of surprising to see the emptiness of a form. And then you look at emptiness and suddenly realize that emptiness is a form. That's surprising too. But the way she relates to that form, it's a surprise to her. The way she relates is another phenomenon, which is quite surprising. How it happens is quite surprising. It has this... It's very, very fresh. And... Pain is fresh and surprising, and pleasure is fresh and surprising.

[48:44]

Blue is fresh and surprising, and the second blue is fresh and surprising, and the third blue is fresh and surprising. Everything's fresh and surprising. Why? Because seeing the way things are is quite surprising. The way things are is very surprising. How come it's surprising? Huh? No, it's not because she doesn't impute. It's what she doesn't impute is she doesn't impute inherent existence to things. So when you don't impute inherent existence, you see how things exist dependently. And the way things exist dependently is very surprising. Or not very surprising, it's just surprising. How things happen is surprising. And also, how they, you know, how your mind goes out there and grasps something and creates it is quite surprising.

[49:53]

Like, you know, one time I walked out of the Zen Do at Tassajara, you know, the monastery that Zen Center has, has blue jays. And the blue jays at Tassajara are very aggressive, especially in the summer. When people are out and about in the warm weather with their bag of lunches, they dive down and go right through your paper, your bag of lunch, and grab food. And if you have food in your hand, they fly down and just take it right out of your hand. All right. Quite surprising. Right. But after a while, you stop being surprised and you just settle into hating blue jays. You start thinking blue jays are like frightening, dangerous birds.

[51:02]

who have inherent existence of being that way rather than these conditions, you know, and this history, plus your mental imputation creates this, like, very aggressive, obnoxious bird. Is it a non-Buddha type of response? Right. We have this monastery for non-Buddhas to come to. We have them come in and we make them into Buddhas when they're there. So they go in there They go and then they go and they go. They do that every day and they sit still like, you know. And they walk out of the door. After sitting there a long time, there's a blue jay out there. But they get surprised by the blue jay. It's not just surprising like it's surprising. It's a surprise attacker. It's a surprise friend.

[52:05]

You know, suddenly you see, oh my God, it's my friend. It's like, you know. He's here meditating in the cold too. He's all kind of like... He gets surprised. You see your mind putting things together, you know. You start to see how the blue jay arises in dependence on mental imputation and conditions and then it's like very surprising it's a surprising fresh blue jay and you and you feel good because you feel like you're free of this old way of like blue jay blue jay blue jay same blue jay you know you're free of somehow you get free of it because of the practice of perfect wisdom get these breaks just a second yes olivia I wanted you to go into that I understand somewhat formless emptiness, but I have a harder time with emptiness, a harder time with that.

[53:19]

Okay. Yeah, so like I, again, to say a form, a color, for example, is something that exists when you have certain conditions. like a certain kind of electromagnetic radiation of a certain wavelength. And then also you have the condition of a sensitive tissue in a living being, like a human living being. You have an eye that is sensitive and responds to, and then it's connected to optic nerve, and the brain's working in a certain way. Consciousness arises. all that happens when these conditions are satisfied you have the conditions for color except you need one more thing to have color mental imputation there are no colors out there is well established physical finding there aren't colors outside of human heads

[54:31]

Can I ask my question? Because I thought you just explained that form is emptiness. Did you explain that emptiness is form? Did you? Because I lost it. No. I'm saying, I didn't say, I don't think I said, I don't even know if I yet showed how form was emptiness. I was actually showing how form happens. I'm talking about the dependent core arising of form. Yeah. Now, I'm talking about how forms exist. Forms do not exist, colors do not exist without mental imputation. Just like rainbows do not exist. They aren't actually up in the sky there. They're only up in the sky when a human being looks at them from a certain angle. Then there's a rainbow. If a human being moves over, there's no rainbow. If the light, if you look on the other side, go around the other side of the rainbow, There ain't no other side to the rainbow. But it seems like there is.

[55:35]

But if you just would look in the other direction, or you talk to somebody who's on the other side of the bay, looking over towards you, they don't see the rainbow. Because you can't see a rainbow when you're looking in the direction the sun's shining. You have to have behind you looking into the water in the air and you can see it when those conditions are met plus have a human being you not only see that shape but you see colors this is a mental imputation and this is the way rainbows exist this is the way colors exist okay the emptiness of that is that that has no existence aside from the mental imputation okay so that's how the color is empty okay now how is the emptiness color The emptiness is that this color has no existence aside from mental imputation. That's the emptiness. But that is actually the color. Is that this color has no existence aside from mental imputation is exactly how the color exists.

[56:44]

That's how the color exists. So the color is right there in the absence of the color's existence outside of the imputation. So when you're looking at how the book or the color has no existence aside from the mental imputation, that's when you see how the book does exist, namely it exists with mental imputation. So you're looking at the emptiness and suddenly you see the form. Look at the form and you meditate on how it's dependent and you see how it's empty. So they're the same thing. When you look at one, you can enter the other. When you look at the other, you can enter the other. Yes. Yes. It's just like that. What is the picture of the two people looking at each other in the vase? That one? It's the same thing, yeah. And... But it's a little bit more surprising than that.

[57:48]

It's more surprising than that. Because, you know, that switch is... It's not... The vase and the two faces meeting each other. You know that? Everybody know that example? Do you know that example, Judy? You have two people looking and it looks like a vase that goes like that. or also the picture of the old lady and the young girl, right? Those examples. The switch there is between two forms, which is kind of fun to see the switch, but this is the switch between form and emptiness, which is much more fresh and it's much more surprising. and much more relieving. You get relieved of the old lady when you see the girl, and you get relieved of the girl when you see the old lady. But here you get relieved of what? Of delusion, of ignorance. Ignorance means you're not surprised by things.

[58:55]

Not being surprised by things is ignorance. Seeing things with wisdom is surprising. You're constantly surprised. What do you mean surprised? Amazed? Amazed, yeah. Amazed, surprised, astounded. In other words, you're alive. You're alive. Not anticipating. You're alive and not afraid of being alive. Yes, Jack? It sounds like in our development, I'm sensing that you wonder how two, three, four were children, or we were once children, we were in that state of awe. And you wonder, and you could make mistakes, and we didn't have quite positive concepts to put names on things, but you were always exploring them. looking for things and wanting to know more, interested in life, finding out more about things.

[60:05]

But we weren't too safe then. We were sort of, I don't know, dangerous. We were dangerous to other people. Yeah. Right? And also we couldn't take care of ourselves very well. Right. That's what we have the monastery for. That's why we have the monastery. We have a nice, simple schedule, you know, so you're safe. And also so you can't hurt other people because we have rules, you know. You're not supposed to hit people and stuff like that. So we simplify the situation to train in this way so that you can, like, go into the place like you were when you were a kid except make it a little safer. But, again, I think the kid, part of the reason why it might be that way for children is that children are afraid, though. because there's some things that children aren't surprised by. They tend not to be surprised. I shouldn't say they're not surprised, but they tend to, like, be fighting against surprise in certain areas.

[61:11]

Like, they do not want to be surprised about their mother or their father. But, you know, it varies from kid to kid, but generally speaking, they do not want to be surprised about their parents. If you, like, if daddy grows a mustache, the kid freaks. If you're growing a mustache, it's not so bad. Little by little. But if daddy just walks in with a mustache on, puts a mustache on one day, the kid freaks. They do not want mommy to cut her hair. They don't want mommy to become a Zen priest. And they don't want that until quite an advanced age. They want stability. Because they're doing that. But in some areas, they haven't learned how to do the mental amputations. Right? So there's a possibility for freshness still in certain areas where they haven't yet learned how to make a book. So we're not so strongly wired to make books.

[62:13]

We're very strongly wired to make faces. We can do faces really early. Maybe you see faces all over the place. You know, you can do something that's a little bit like a face and they go at a certain age. We're very cued to mentally impute, to conceptually grasp certain images that aren't out there. But we're looking for them. Where's the face? Where's the face? At a certain point, the baby do not see the face. And then they're kind of like. And then things start to come together and they start to see the face, namely their eyes get positioned, the conditions get set up, and then they come up with the image of the face. And they do not want certain faces to change. However, there's other things, like books and words, that they do not know how to impute yet. They don't have the concept and know how to do it with the conditions.

[63:15]

And as they're learning that, they're having a lot of fun. Once they get it tuned in and they start creating these things, then they lose their, in that area, they gradually lose their creativity too. They start to tighten down and get scared of those things that get established. Until finally, you got everything nailed down and you're scared of everything. Now the reverse process is to realize that and start loosening up by realizing that this is what you're doing. And the teaching says you've got to stop agreeing with this version that these things actually exist independent of what you did to make them for yourself. There was a time when you didn't have these things. They didn't exist for you. They were there, but they didn't exist for you because you didn't know how to impute them. Now you do, but you've lost track of the fact of how they're made.

[64:22]

So we have to get into the workshop of creation and to notice how delusion works in order to become free of this and stop agreeing with it. The process of creating these images will continue, but you can stop agreeing with the way they appear as reality. That makes a big difference. Yes? I have an experience that I would like to put in the context of this. Part of the experience was very simple. I said I'm going to try and be touchless, present for the duration of this block. And... And all of a sudden I saw a pattern of dark and light. I was sort of detached, you know, I was comfortable. And then all of a sudden I was really quite surprised at the birds.

[65:27]

And when the stone said, the danger, as I was remembering that experience, I said, oh, birds. It's like, it gelled together into something that was just birds, not the pattern of light and dark. And I was thinking, God, if they had been, uh, warrior birds, very dangerous birds, I would have been in danger because I didn't recognize all of a sudden that these were birds. So I could see the importance of the convention, recognizing our conventions. And being simultaneous with such freshness that I do recognize It's just a bunch of birds. Yeah, and conventions are conventional truths or conventional realities. These things which do exist with imputation are very important in our practice because that's the realm of compassion.

[66:35]

We're compassionate towards these faces, towards these birds, towards these light and dark which turn into birds. We're compassionate. This is where our compassion, this is where our patience goes. This is where our generosity goes. This is where our precepts go. This is where the scriptures go. This is where the teaching goes. This is where the language of the Buddha goes. All this stuff is very useful and very important. Like the birth of reality. Like a birth of reality. Yeah, yeah, right. I don't know who's next, but maybe Barry or Did you have a hand up for a while, Fran? Okay, Fran and then Barry. I was wondering if you could say how the teaching of MTSS was as we go into compassion. That was exactly my question. Well, it's... First of all, the gift of it, I mean, the giving of the teaching is a gift from those who have wisdom who also want other people to have wisdom.

[67:44]

So it's an act of generosity on the part of wise people to give this teaching. That's one sense that is compassion. It's compassion in the sense that it's a gift. It's actually a verbal gift. It's giving compassion. The first, in some sense, the most basic form of compassion is generosity, giving. And there's three basic things to give, material things, teachings of reality, and fearlessness. These are the three basic kinds of gifts. How can you give fearlessness? Well, by... You know, if people are afraid and you're fearless, you go into the situation and show them what fearlessness looks like. Show them that it's possible. And they kind of like can pick up on it. You can also sometimes go and tell them that they don't need to be afraid. And you can actually talk to them about how they don't need to be.

[68:47]

And you can show them that you're not. And if you're not, you can show you're not. And they can see that it's possible. And it might be that they're sort of on the same status and situation as you are. I mean, they might be standing right at the edge of the same cliff you're at. What? Yeah, the teachings, the Dharma teachings, the gift of Dharma, the gift of the truth, the gift of reality the gift of of the of the teaching and that's the highest gift and fearlessness is a second highest and material things are in some sense next and then material things are also ranked but in terms of value but all those things can be given and those are all compassion so a teaching like this is a material thing because it's like You have been given this piece of paper that's a material thing you've given, but it's also a Dharma teaching, and it also has a teaching about fearlessness in it.

[69:49]

So this piece of paper has all three. So that's an act of compassion, the giving of it. But another thing about wisdom or the teaching of form and emptiness is that teaching, if you understand it, will liberate your compassion. So for you to study this teaching is an act of compassion. For you to give this teaching is an act of compassion. For you to give the teaching as generosity, for you to study it as diligence. And also for you to study it as patience, because it's kind of difficult. And also for you to study, it takes some concentration. So there's a lot of compassion involved in studying the teaching. And when you understand it, when you understand formless emptiness, that liberates your compassion from all kinds of hindrance. So when there's no hindrance, there's no fear.

[70:51]

And when there's no fear, there's no hindrance. So the fear removes your hindrance to your compassion. So does that give you some idea about? Yes. Yes. well for example the blue jay you're looking at a blue jay and you have a fixed idea about the blue jay and you want to practice compassion but not with this critter like you know like i travel around and I haven't traveled in certain areas of the country, but actually I had traveled in Texas. But even in Texas, the people who come to my retreats, people are willing to be kind and compassionate about almost everybody but George Bush. So George Bush is, to a lot of us, is a form or an idea. But because we don't find him surprising and amazing and... What's the other?

[71:54]

Yeah. If you find him amazing, that's good. Astounding. Because of that, we sometimes think, well, I don't have to practice compassion towards him. But you also could just say, you know, I dearly hope that the kind thing of him being removed from office would happen. You know, and you could really feel that as a kindness to him and the whole planet. Maybe that he'd be removed from office. But you could do that in a kind way if you actually were free of your ideas of him. If you could see the emptiness, if you could see how he was actually, his existence dependent on your mental imputation, and he has no existence aside from that, that would release your compassion towards him. But there's some people who we don't feel compassionate towards. Even some people we love a lot, we don't feel compassion towards in a sense because we really care for them and we really want the best for them, but we don't want them to do what they're doing and we'll even be mean to them or even violent towards them if they don't do what we think is best for them.

[73:12]

Right? People are cruel to people who they think are most important in their life sometimes. That's not compassion, to be cruel to people. We're not kidding about it. That's very simple. To hurt people, to make them afraid, making people afraid is not helpful. Making people tense up and close down and, you know, be miserable is not compassion. But people do that to people who they want to help because they're ignorant because they don't understand form is emptiness in other words that they think that this person actually inherently exists as somebody who's doing the wrong thing and if they inherently exist as if you think of them that way you can do cruel things to them and also if you think of them that way you will be afraid of many things about that person and about what they'll do

[74:17]

You'll be afraid in many ways, and therefore you'll be unskillful. And compassion is not unskillful. Compassion is skillful. Compassion is being skillful with people. And wisdom facilitates being skillful. You can want to be skillful. That's compassion. But if you don't have wisdom, your wish to be compassionate and skillful with people can be undermined. And if you don't understand that colors, if you think colors inherently exist, which most people do, and you believe that, which most people do, most people think that and they believe it, and therefore they relate unskillfully to colors and feelings and ideas about people. Right? People look at a color and they freak out because they think the color has an inherent existence.

[75:21]

Even though we just told the person that the color only exists in dependence on mental imputation. And there ain't no color there aside from mental imputation. They heard that, but they don't believe it. They think there actually is an inherent existence to the color. And when they think that, they relate in a strange, unskillful, and potentially cruel way. And it can be cruel like you're really attached to the person, or you really want to, like, get rid of the person. But if you still understand form is emptiness, you will relate skillfully to the color. And also, you won't be able to understand formless emptiness if you don't practice compassion. If you're not generous and you don't practice the precepts and you're not patient and you're not diligent and you're not concentrated, you won't be able to listen to the teaching

[76:23]

and hit that thing and do the chants and, you know, you won't be able to be interested in something like form is emptiness and emptiness is form if you're not compassionate. Now, some people could be like, say, well, I heard that if you, like, learn that teaching you can really, like, wipe out a lot of people. So some cruel people might say, yeah, I think that would really help me, like, I heard that, you know. But this sutra is for removing hindrance It's not for creating hindrance. It's for removing hindrance not to violence, but removing the hindrance that creates violence. This will remove obstructions to kindness, this sutra, if you study it. That's the proposal of it. It's to relieve suffering and to liberate us from unskillful, cruel behavior simply by, you know, There was this guy at Zen Center a few years ago.

[77:29]

His name was Suzuki. He's called the founder. He was a little Japanese guy. And little means he was about maybe less than five feet tall. But he was really kind of a nice guy. He really seemed to care about people. Like he seemed to care about me. And not just me. But he cared about me quite a bit. He had time to care about this young guy from Minnesota. And a lot of other people. And people were really impressed by what a nice guy he was. What was his teaching? What was the teaching of this really nice, kind of wise, kind, cute, loving, enlightened guy? What was his teaching? Form is emptiness. Emptiness is form. That was the teaching he gave. What's your teaching? Form is emptiness. Form is not different from emptiness. This is a teaching of a kind person. This is a teaching of avalokiteshvara bodhisattva.

[78:33]

This is a teaching of the bodhisattva of infinite compassion. What does the bodhisattva of infinite compassion teach? Well, sometimes the bodhisattva of infinite compassion says, be nice to people. Sometimes the bodhisattva says, think about me. Think about the way I am. Think about the way I'm compassionate. Meditate on me. Always think of me. Whenever you're doing, always think of the bodhisattva of infinite compassion. That's sometimes what the bodhisattva says. But in this sutta, the bodhisattva says, form is emptiness. The bodhisattva of compassion says, form is emptiness. Emptiness is form. Form is not different from emptiness. The same is true of feelings, perceptions, impulses, and consciousness. That's what the bodhisattva of infinite compassion is saying to people. That's what the Bodhisattva is saying to people, and that's what the Bodhisattva is looking at in her heart. She's looking at her heart and telling what she sees there. She's looking at emptiness. And here's infinite, unhindered compassion coming out in the form of her telling you what she's seeing.

[79:34]

And if you would see what she sees, then you would also be like, with compassion. You might be doing heart sutra. You might be doing something else. You might be saying, would you like some tea? For two? One could go on about this. But, you know, it's 9-16, so we could also stop and come back another day. Please continue to think about emptiness as much as you can. Please try to develop interest in it. and study it and think about it and recite the scripture and and then if you can examine it but if you can't come to class and we'll examine it together write down your questions that come up in your mind about it bring them to class so we can like examine examine examine the more we examine this the more you get closer to actually being convinced of this teaching

[80:46]

So don't take it on faith. Study it. If you have questions, bring them out. They're welcome. Does that make sense? Okay. Good night.

[81:00]

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