The big picture of the practice that's The Buddhist Samadhis and the non-Buddhist Samadhis or I should say Buddhist Samadhis which are not particularly Buddhist. Many I think many of us are during this session and other times are just practicing regular Samadhi practice which is not particularly Buddhist which we call Samadhi number two lately, simply developing concentration. And then during this practice period and during this session I'm bringing out how to develop and realize the Buddhist Samadhis and what makes a Samadhi Buddhist is that it's not just concentration but it's concentration illuminated by wisdom and in particular wisdom

[01:08]

which sees the truths that are taught by the Buddha. There could be other kinds of wisdom too that would illuminate some other kinds of Samadhis but in particular in the presentation I was giving you of Samadhi three and four, those are the Samadhis which are illuminated by wisdom which sees various kinds of truth taught in the Buddhist tradition. And then to this end of learning how to develop these liberating Samadhis of the Buddhist tradition I've been bringing up the traditional presentation of how to develop wisdom by using these three kinds of wisdom and then in addition in the traditional presentation the three kinds of wisdom study the various teachings about what the truths are and other things too.

[02:18]

I also thought I might mention that just as all states of mind, all states of consciousness have this quality of Samadhi, also all states of mind have the quality of intelligence, or the mental factor of intelligence. And all states of mind have the mental factor of mindfulness. But just as even though all states of mind have the quality of or the nature of Samadhi as accompanying them and that Samadhi can be developed and the mind can become absorbed in this Samadhi quality, similarly the mind can develop and become absorbed in the intellect.

[03:26]

And the intellect, as it's developed more and more, becomes a wisdom. Wisdom is developing the discriminating powers of the mind to the point where they actually can see reality, where they can discriminate exactly the way things are. Also, I ran into a different rendition of the so-called four seals of all Buddhist teaching, of all authentically Buddhist teaching.

[04:27]

Another way that I heard it put was, no substance, no self, no duration, in other words impermanence, no bliss except Nirvana. So, no bliss except Nirvana. We previously said that all contaminated phenomena are misery and Nirvana is peace. So, by saying no bliss but Nirvana you're saying that except for in the state of liberation which purifies these contaminations, there's no bliss. We've discussed to some extent the two truths as they were presented by the vibes.

[05:43]

And I just wanted to mention that another important area to look at in their presentation is the consciousnesses, their teachings on the consciousness which know these objects, these truths. But I'm going to postpone that for the sake of going on to the next school. But before going on to the next school I wanted to review a little bit the presentation of the Vaibhashika school. So, again, they present the four noble truths and the two truths of conventional and ultimate reality. And after presenting the truths,

[06:52]

the question in the Abhidharma Kosha is, how are these truths seen? And the answer is, which I already read was, firm in cultivation endowed with hearing and reflection, she will be able to give herself up to Samadhi. So, those are the three wisdoms. So, the three wisdoms are the way that we are able to see the truths. And then it says, whoever desires to see the truths should first of all keep the precepts. That's all they say at the beginning. Then, he reads the teachings upon which the seeing the truth depends or hears their meaning. Based on having heard, she correctly reflects and ponders and analyzes.

[08:07]

Having reflected, she gives herself up to the cultivation of Samadhi. With the wisdom arisen from teaching, for its support, there arises the wisdom arisen from reflection. With this wisdom arisen from reflection or critical analysis, for its support, there arises a wisdom arisen from meditation. So again, one way to hear this is, according to this school, this early teaching, which is trying to systematize Buddha's teaching on wisdom, that the first kind of wisdom is based on hearing and studying, the second kind of wisdom based on pondering, continuous further study inwardly, analyzing, criticizing the teaching, understanding it more deeply.

[09:11]

And these first two levels of activity are discursive thought, conceptual thought. And then, this understanding as a base, one enters into Samadhi. And in Samadhi, one uses the results of this discursive conceptual study as the basis for a non-conceptual direct awareness of the truth. It doesn't exactly say that there, but I'm telling you that it's in there, in this presentation. And then also, in this presentation, it says, it's more about the nature of these three kinds of wisdom. And then, it goes into, actually, a discussion of the precepts, in the sense that it talks about how the yogi who's going to now proceed on this path of wisdom needs to be kind of like, eat and drink moderately, cast aside all kinds of busyness,

[10:19]

don't be worried about how fancy your robes are, or how nice a seat you have, or whether, you know, you have a good view. In other words, be content with simple things, and then you'll be ready to practice. And then, they go into practicing Samadhi. And then, there's a section in here on meditation on breath. And then, there's a section in here on the six aspects of mindfulness of breathing. And then, it says, we have spoken of the two teachings, the two teachings on Samadhi. Having attained Samadhi by these two portals, now, with a view of realizing vipassana, insight, and then here comes a verse, having realized calm, she will cultivate the foundations of mindfulness.

[11:28]

So then, they go into cultivating the foundations of mindfulness, which are mindfulness of body, mindfulness of feelings, mindfulness of consciousness, and mindfulness of Dharma. And mindfulness of Dharma includes studying, for example, the teaching of the five aggregates, the teaching of the 12 doors of sensory arisal, the 18 realms of sensory experience, the Four Noble Truths, the Two Truths, the hindrances to meditation. All these teachings then come into the third level. So here, in this text, first you calm down, then you practice foundation of mindfulness. It's not always practiced that way, as you may know. Some people go to, for example, vipassana centers and go right into practicing mindfulness practice

[12:30]

without first doing the calming practices. But in this text, first of all, it says, first of all, you learn the truths, then you calm down, then you practice mindfulness, and then you go through these levels of mindfulness, and then you start looking at the teachings which you already studied. Now, it's also okay to not do the calming practice first and go right into the mindfulness. And when you get to the fourth kind of mindfulness, then start studying Buddhism and learn about the five aggregates and so on. So it doesn't have to be that way. But here, when they get to the four foundations of mindfulness, and you come to the fourth type, which is the most subtle, you're already calm, you've already learned the teaching, it's already in your system, and then you can go to work. But I just wanted to mention here also, I think it will come up today, is that right after they introduce the foundations of mindfulness,

[13:36]

before they even said what they are, they said, having realized stillness, having realized calm, she will cultivate the foundation of mindfulness. And it says, how is this? And it says, by considering the twofold characteristics of body, sensation, mind, and dharmas. So they told you the different areas, and then they tell you that you're going to consider the twofold characteristics of these four categories, these four foundations of mindfulness. So this is in the Vaibhashika system that Vasubandhu is presenting, and the twofold characteristics of body, and so on. One characteristic is called the own characteristics, or the specific characteristics, sphalakshina.

[14:41]

Spha means like own. The own marks or the own characteristics of, for example, the body, and feelings, and so on. And then the other kind of characteristics are called the general characteristics, or common characteristics, of body, of bodies, of feelings, of consciousness. The specific characteristics of the body are like the characteristics of, basically, the characteristics of, for example, your body, or somebody else's body. The specific characteristics of a feeling are exactly the specifics of the feeling. The specific characteristics of consciousness are the specific, detailed, rich, and varied qualities of consciousness, and so on, for all the teachings. The general characteristics of these four foundations

[15:43]

of mindfulness, the general characteristics are, can you guess? What? Right, that's one of them. But now that's a hint, right? What's the other? So, one's impermanence, yes? Huh? No self, yeah? What? Miserable, yeah? What else? Well, no, not interdependent. That screws up the misery part. Well, it says four here, because they elaborate, there's selflessness and emptiness, shunya and anatman. So, these are the general characteristics of the phenomena that you look at, general characteristics of body and so on. These are the general characteristics.

[16:45]

So, the specific characteristics could also be called the unique characteristics. So, then it goes on, and basically the course now is a course in deepening these mindfulness practices. And it also asks, how come, and then it says, what are the foundations of mindfulness? And then they say, yeah, what is the foundation of mindfulness? And it says, there's three kinds of foundations of mindfulness. One is foundation of mindfulness itself, another is foundation of mindfulness through connection, and the other is foundation of mindfulness by being an object. Okay? Foundation of mindfulness itself is what? It's wisdom. But then somebody says, well, it isn't really wisdom, is it? I said, well, it sort of is, because it's like,

[17:53]

the Vaibhashikas say, it's like, they use the example, it's like an axe. It actually says a wedge here. But it's like an axe handle, relative to an axe blade and wood. So, the actual blade of the axe handle is wisdom, and the wood is like delusions or defilements. But the handle that you have on the thing, that puts the power into the blade, that's the mindfulness. So mindfulness applies the wisdom to the phenomena. So in that way, the foundations of mindfulness are a way to apply wisdom to phenomena. So then this course in Foundation of Mindfulness goes on here and gets basically more and more developed

[18:56]

until there is seeing the truths directly. So it's Chapter 6 in here, if you want to study that. And I brought those things up because that will prepare you for the next school, I think. So please excuse me for not doing sort of the other half of the story of the Vaibhashika presentation of consciousnesses. I'd like to go on now to the next school,

[20:00]

which is called Sautrantika. Sautra means of the sutras, and Sautrantika then is a person following the sutras. And part of the reason why they give them this name is because they put more emphasis, they rely more on the sutras than on the Abhidharma. The Sautrantikas tend to... A lot of the Sautrantikas say that they don't really think that the systematic presentation of Buddha's teaching on wisdom, that the systematic version of Buddha's critique of naïve realism, they don't think that the way that Abhidharma put it is really the way... really Buddha's words. They think it's the work of the Buddha's scholastic disciples. So they want to go back and use the sutras as the source. And there are two schools,

[21:05]

two sub-schools of the Sautrantika. One is those following the scriptures. They both follow the scriptures, but one more follows the scriptures than the other, because the other also follows reasoning. So those two schools, those who follow reasoning and those who follow scriptures. Vasubandhu in this Abhidharmakosha is kind of an example of following the scriptures type of Sautrantika. So he's an expert on Vaibhashika. He presents it and then he comes in and presents the Sautrantika position of following the scriptures. And then the other school, the other version of the Sautrantika is represented by Dignaga and his disciple Dharmakirti. They represent the Sautrantika school of following reasoning.

[22:07]

Now the way that the Sautrantika school following the scriptures understands the two truths is basically the same as the way it's presented in the Abhidharmakosha. So Vasubandhu doesn't criticize the presentation which you've already heard of the two truths. And again the two truths, the definition of the two truths in the Vaibhashika system is that a conventional truth is something which if broken physically, broken up physically or mentally is some object or some phenomena which if broken up physically or mentally the consciousness which knew it or the consciousness which apprehended it ceases. And then they give an example of like a jug or water.

[23:13]

And the reason why they give those two examples is because there's two types in that system, two types of conventional truths. One is a shape and the other is a collection. So a jug is like a shape, so if you physically destroy the shape or mentally destroy the shape the consciousness apprehending that phenomena ceases. Water however is more of a collection so if you break the collection up in parts, collections of water into parts, you still have the water. So you have to actually analyze the water itself in order to realize that it's a conventional truth. Ultimate truths are those which are things which if you break them up physically or mentally the consciousness which knew them doesn't cease. The consciousness can still know them after they're changed. And you might say then it's a consciousness

[24:15]

which can deal with impermanence. Or the ultimate truths, although the Vibhashikas don't put it that way, the ultimate truths are truths which aren't disturbed by impermanence. Even though the conventional truth seems to be impermanent and the ultimate truth seems to be permanent. So the ultimate truth that's permanent is not disturbed by impermanence. It's not presenting itself as permanent. So the conventional truth presents itself as permanent and can't deal with impermanence. And this ultimate truth presents itself as being able to deal with impermanence, so it's permanent. And the consciousness which knows it is not disturbed by the impermanence. Okay, now the Satrantika, so the Satrantika presentation

[25:16]

of the two truths in the sutra following side we already did basically, you have that principle. And another characteristic of the Vibhashika system is that with 18 schools it's actually hard to get them to agree about which of the innumerable phenomena there are in the world, which are the conventional and which are the ultimate truths. So there seems to be some agreement that in the school it looks like they agree space is an ultimate truth for them. And the analytic cessation is an ultimate truth for them. Yeah, Vibhashikas. Yeah. Okay. I was saying that for the Vibhashikas

[26:20]

it's not clear what they actually think which are the ultimate and conventional truths. But it looks like they think those things I just mentioned are ultimates. But also it looks like they think the skandhas are ultimates. So in other words, if the meditator is looking at skandhas you're looking at ultimate truths. So if you're looking at skandhas and a pot's broken, the consciousness which was looking at the pot but seeing the skandhas, that consciousness is not disturbed. But if you're looking at a pot and you don't see the skandhas, then when the pot breaks the consciousness ceases. So if you look at a person and you see the skandhas, then you don't see the self of the person.

[27:23]

You don't find the self of the person. If you look at a pot and see the skandhas, you don't see the self of the pot. So if the pot's broken, it doesn't matter to you because you weren't seeing the pot in the first place because the pot is not one of the skandhas. The listing of the forms in the skandhas, the pot isn't on the list. There's colors, there's smells, there's tastes, there's touches, and there's sounds, but there's not pots. So if a pot presents itself and you see it in terms of the aggregates, if the pot gets broken, you still see it, you're still seeing aggregates, you're still seeing colors or you're still hearing sounds or you're still hearing silence. So for the Vaibhashika system, the five aggregates are ultimates.

[28:26]

And if you look at the ultimates, then that will free you from naive realism. That will free you from making things too real, particularly making people too real. And also, the definition of a Vaibhashika is a person who... Do you remember? A person who holds teachings which are concerned with personal liberation and second and third... where are the third points? Second and third points, do you remember? What? Denies or does not accept self-consciousness and... What? External objects really exist. Yeah, that's the Vaibhashika.

[29:27]

And again, self-consciousness means it's being able to be aware of the consciousness at the same time you're aware of the object. In the Satyantika system, they also hold these teachings which are held to be true in the context of personal liberation, and they accept both the reality of external objects and self-consciousness. And there's one revision in that is that actually it's the Vaibhashika, it's the Satyantikas, the followers of the scriptures who follow reasoning that have that position. The ones who follow the scriptures, like Vasubandhu, they also do not accept self-consciousness. And so, for years, studying the Abhidharmakosha,

[30:31]

I thought that the Satyantikas and the Vaibhashikas accepted that consciousness only knew the objects and did not know the subject, because that's what the Abhidharmakosha says. Consciousness can know all dharmas. It can know the defiled dharmas, the contaminated dharmas, which is all the dharmas except for two types of cessation in space. It can know all that, but there's one thing consciousness can't know, and that's itself. But this next school says, no, in addition to that, there can be consciousness being aware of consciousness in the following reasoning section of the Satyantikas. So that's the definition of a Satyantika.

[31:35]

They assert the true existence of both external objects and self-consciousness, if they're the reasoning following school, and that's the one I'm going to talk about, because the sutra following school sees the two truths the same way as the Vaibhashikas, which you've already learned. Okay? Which of those two sub-schools is the Sarvastivadana? Sarvastivadana is a sub-school of the... and sometimes it's considered equivalent, but really it's a sub-school of the Vaibhashikas. They say all things... all things, that means something that performs a function, they all exist, and even they exist in three times. So they say that even past tathas exist and future tathas exist. So they're really into all... so there's a function of a past tatha and a function of a future tatha and a function of a present tatha.

[32:37]

That's the Sarvastivadana, that's the Vaibhashika type. Okay, now... what about objects? What kind of objects does this system present? Well, all objects can be divided into two truths. They can be divided into specifically characterized phenomena and generally characterized phenomena. Which I just told you about. When you start practicing mindfulness with the body or feelings or whatever, you're supposed to learn how to see the specific characteristics and the general characteristics. In other words, how to see the specific characteristics of the body and the general characteristics

[33:39]

of the body and the general characteristics. Okay? So here, all phenomena can be divided into those two specifically characterized phenomena and generally characterized phenomena. They can also be broken into negative phenomena and positive phenomena, manifest phenomena, hidden phenomena into three times and into single and different phenomena. Here comes the fun part. This is one of the fun parts. Now, what should I do first here?

[34:44]

I'm in trouble with which is the most sensible way to do this. Whether I present the different phenomena or the different types of consciousness or the different objects. Okay. I think I'll do the consciousnesses first.

[36:14]

Yeah. So this system teaches basically two types of consciousness and the first kind of consciousness is called conceptual consciousness. And the next kind is called perceptual consciousness. Or you could say conceptual cognition and the other one would be perceptual cognition. But also you could call one conceptuality and you call the other one direct perception. And one involves, one kind of cognition involves conceptuality and the other is non-conceptual. Okay, these are the two types of cognition

[37:18]

that the system teaches. And I think I'll just say right off that the objects appearing to conceptual cognition are conventional truths and the objects appearing to direct perception or non-conceptual cognition are ultimate truths. The objects appearing to conceptual cognition are conventional truths and the objects appearing to direct cognition or direct perception are ultimate truths. Okay.

[38:20]

Now I'm going to go back and give you the definitions of the ultimate truths and the conventional truths in this school. I guess I didn't want to do this because it's such a hard definition. But anyway, the ultimate truth, the definition of ultimate truth is a phenomena which is able to bear logical analysis as an ultimate truth from the point of view of whether it has its own mode of existence without depending on imputation by thought or terminology for its existence. One of the other names for this school is the darshtantika school. And darshtantika means exemplifiers because they give examples. So one of the ways to make this clear to you

[39:26]

is to give you some examples. And I don't know if it's good to tell people that you're about to tell them something surprising or let them experience it themselves. But let's just say I didn't tell you this was surprising. So examples of ultimate truths in this system are specifically characterized phenomena. Remember before we were talking about specifically characterized and generally characterized? So the ultimate truths are specifically characterized rather than generally characterized. Now do you remember what kind of things were generally characterized before? That's the character, impermanence. But what kind of things are generally characterized? Compounded things. So these things, I'm not saying they're not compounded, I'm not saying that, but I'm just saying in the previous system, uncompounded things,

[40:28]

that the compounded things were the ones that were generally characterized by impermanence, no self, and if they were contaminated, misery. In this case, the first example, the first example of an ultimate truth is a specifically characterized phenomenon. Another example is a functioning thing. Another example is, that's not an example, examples, sorry, those aren't examples, those are synonyms. Those are synonyms for ultimate truth. A specifically characterized phenomenon, a functioning thing, an impermanent thing, a product, and a truly existent phenomenon. So in this system, impermanent things

[41:30]

are the ultimate truths. Ultimate truths are impermanent things. Okay? Is that surprising? Yeah, I said impermanent. So in this system, an impermanent thing is an ultimate truth. Pardon? The truth is not that it's impermanent. An impermanent thing is an ultimate truth. When you're looking at an impermanent thing, you're looking at an ultimate truth. So this is a big one, okay? When you're looking at an impermanent thing, you're looking at an ultimate truth. But, remember I just mentioned the kind of cognition which sees ultimate truths? What kind is that?

[42:32]

Non-conceptual, direct cognition see ultimate truths. So when I say, when you look at or when you see an impermanent thing, you're looking at an ultimate truth in this system? I don't mean your regular looking at things. I mean a direct, non-conceptual cognition of an impermanent thing. At that time, you're looking at an ultimate truth in the system. Now this particular point, I don't know if I should open this one up right now. Just don't let me not go back to this, okay? This is a big one. Okay? So remind me to come back to this in a little while. Would you? Like not more than 10 minutes. And no questions, otherwise it'll have to be an hour. Okay? But did you get that? A synonym for an ultimate truth in this system

[43:34]

is an impermanent thing. And so we already said that everything, all the ultimate truths, they come to us through direct perceptions. So this would be a direct perception of an impermanent thing would be actually seeing an ultimate truth. It's not that something is impermanent. It's the actual impermanent thing that's the ultimate truth. So examples of ultimate truths in this system are the kinds of things that you can buy at that ... Is it a Dutch furniture company in the East Bay? Ikea? And the kinds of things you can buy at Ikea. Those are ultimate truths. So you want to just go over there and walk in there and there's the ultimate truth in that room.

[44:34]

Pardon? I've never been there. It's got a big parking lot. It's right off the freeway. Anyway, chairs, tables, houses, persons, pets, pots, jugs, small particles. These are ultimate truths. They're also impermanent, aren't they? Impermanent things, aren't they? They're also ... What else are they? They're products. They're specifically characterized phenomena. Now you can deal with them as generally characterized phenomena also, but under this heading of seeing them as looking at a pot or a chair or a person

[45:40]

in terms of seeing ultimate truth, you don't look at them and you're not seeing their general characteristics, you're seeing their specific characteristics. Now a conventional truth in this situation is a phenomenon which only exists through being imputed by thought or terminology. Now in the previous definition I just gave you what it says in the text, that it's a phenomenon that exists in its own mode of existence without depending on imputation, but I think it should say not depending entirely on imputation because it does depend on imputation somewhat, whereas a conventional phenomenon depends ... That's what the conventional things are. So synonyms

[46:42]

for conventional truth would be ... Do you remember the synonyms for the ultimate truth? What would the synonyms for conventional things be? What's a big one? Permanent. Permanent things are conventional truth. A permanent phenomenon is a conventional truth. Hmm? Well, just a second. A non-product. A false existence. A generally characterized phenomenon. A non-functioning phenomenon. These are synonyms for ... Oh, and also, a phenomenon appearing to what kind of consciousness? Conceptual. So, that's not exactly a synonym, but it's sort of like a synonym because an object appearing to a conceptual consciousness

[47:47]

is a conventional truth. And now you say, like what? Like what is the generic image of the things I just mentioned as ultimate truths? Those are conventionalities or conventional truths. Huh? Italian, yeah. So if you go over to IKEA and you walk in, and you look at those things with your conceptual consciousness, what you see in your conceptual consciousness actually is a generic version of the furniture that's specifically in the room, which you don't see. What you see is your conceptual rendition of it. If you saw directly the specific furniture,

[48:51]

you would just, you know, I don't know what would happen to you. You might have to sit down in one of the chairs to enjoy a direct perception. You probably wouldn't be able to buy anything. That's why they want to work the concepts over there on you. So if you're in the same room that I told you to go to for the ultimate truths, you're in the same room looking at the same stuff, but what you're looking at is the generic image of everything you're looking at. That's what's actually appearing to your consciousness. So the generic image of tables, people, you know, even individual people, you have a generic reed and a generic carillon and a generic cedar and a generic holly and a generic susan and so on. Not the specific and the generic people that they're like impermanent and stuff like that, right?

[49:54]

The generic things have these qualities. These specific things have these specific qualities, like they're specifically what they are. Those are the ultimate truths and they're impermanent. But the generic things, as you'll see more later on, they're permanent. The generic things are permanent. There's no way for them to change and they have no function. They don't function. Now they are, you could say, well, don't they function as sources of misery? Not if you understand them. They really don't have, they're kind of like, they don't function. And here's another one. This is with a kind of killer. And this isn't the killer. This is easy. Another one example of a conventional truth is uncompounded space, which is the mere absence of obstructing

[50:59]

contact. Now that's a different space from the space in the other system, which was not just the mere absence of obstruction, but it was emphasizing the way space accommodates things. And space is uncompounded in the previous system, but they emphasized the function of it, accommodating things without hindrance. In this case, they're saying that isn't really a function and that is a non-functioning, falsely existing, permanent conventional truth. Permanent phenomena conventional truth. And then the next one is the selflessness or the emptiness of a person's emptiness Emptiness of being substantially existent is also a conventional truth. In the previous situation, what they wanted you to learn to see

[52:01]

was that persons lacked substantial existence, so they wanted you to be able to see the non-existence, the emptiness of the substantial existence of the person. Now they're saying that this emptiness, that this selflessness, which we need to see actually, on the path, that this selflessness is a conventional truth, is a false existence. Wasn't that a little surprising? Once you get used to it, it seems like Buddhism is really alive with activity. Okay, so now I'd like to say a little bit about the two kinds of consciousness, a little bit more about the two kinds of consciousness. Okay, this is helpful, I think.

[53:09]

So, for each So, conceptual consciousness means that it's a cognition of what's going on in our life, but the cognition is mediated by a concept, so it's not direct. What the consciousness actually knows is a conceptual version of whatever is happening. So this system does say there are external objects, it's still saying there's something that exists, but it says what you know is a conceptual rendition of it. So it says there are people and so on, this system says there are people, the other one says there are people too, but now we're talking about that when we know people, or when we know jugs, or when we know tables, when we go to the furniture store, we look at the furniture, but actually what we see is a concept, what actually appears to the mind

[54:12]

is a concept, this is conceptual consciousness, okay? Now, but what appears to the direct perception is the furniture. What were you going to say? The furniture appears to the direct perception because direct perception sees ultimate truth and furniture is ultimate truth with no intervening concept. So we distinguish between also, there's two types of objects for both of these types of consciousness. One type of object is the appearing object, or the object as it appears to the consciousness and the other kind of object is the object of engagement.

[55:14]

It's the way the consciousness actually meets the object. So in conceptual consciousness the actual engagement with the furniture, okay, it does engage with the furniture, you can go into the furniture store and sure enough there's furniture there and you know it and you know it because the furniture store has had some impact on you. So you're actually there, your mind is actually engaging with it. But the conceptual consciousness sees a generic version of everything that the mind is engaged with and that's what appears to the consciousness, is the generic version. So there's no specific things, just you're dealing with generic things. And

[56:16]

what you're seeing is entirely due to imputation. Yes? Pardon? It means that you're putting a concept of something onto something and it usually means also that after you put the concept on the thing, you can't see how it was an imputation and you think that what you put on it is the thing. Okay? However, in this school, even though something is due to imputation entirely and what you're seeing, in other words what you're seeing is entirely due to imputation, what appears to you is due to imputation in conceptual consciousness. What appears to you, what you know, is entirely due to imputation.

[57:22]

Okay? And it's a conventional truth and it falsely exists. Although it falsely exists, it does exist. It does exist. It's a conventional existence and a conventional truth. So for example, so an example of something that's not a conventional truth, I was talking to somebody about it, an example of not a conventional truth and not an ultimate truth is the famous one is like a furry turtle. Now some people might also say another example is a horny rabbit but that's not quite right. It's a rabbit with horns because of course there are lots of horny rabbits. However, horny rabbits

[58:26]

when they're conventional truths it's not the actual horny rabbit because a horny rabbit actually is an ultimate truth. It's the generic image of the horny rabbit that is the conventional truth. But actually a rabbit with horns is not a conventional truth. There's no such thing. It doesn't exist at all. But what does exist, if you think of a rabbit with horns, what does exist is the meaningful image or the meaning image of the rabbit with horns. That exists in the mind. That does exist. And all the things that conceptual consciousness is dealing with are these impermanent excuse me, permanent things. The image of basically a rabbit with horns is permanent, it's not changing. You may have a variety of rabbits with horns but each one is permanent. And also

[59:32]

that impermanent thing that impermanent did I say impermanent? That permanent thing is actually characterized by impermanence because it's characterized by these general characteristics but to you it seems like a permanent thing because it does look like that because I can't change because it's just totally imagination. And so now maybe I'll just jump over to the other one direct perception. In direct perception the engagement with the object and the way the object appears are the same. So

[60:37]

the way a chair the way the mind actually engages the chair engages the person is the same as the way it appears to the consciousness. So it engages the specific chair the specific person without in a sense jazzing them up at the same time watering them down by making them into a generic image. There's a little imputation but it's not solely imputed there's some imputation but imputation is maybe I'm wrong and maybe there's no imputation but I think there's maybe there's no imputation, I'll take it back there's no imputation in this school but it still depends on mind to some extent otherwise it couldn't happen because we're talking about a consciousness.

[61:40]

So maybe it's okay to say no imputation in other words that there's no conceptual laying over on the object which is being misconstrued with the object. As a result there can be direct awareness of the impermanence of this thing and again in this system it's very important to distinguish between gross impermanence and subtle impermanence. Subtle impermanence is a characteristic of all phenomena is a characteristic of these ultimate truths. Subtle phenomena means the way the thing is changing constantly moment by moment. Gross impermanence means that the thing will like a person will eventually end or die and be dispersed. But the subtle impermanence is the way the person is changing all the time.

[62:40]

But the subtle impermanence doesn't appear to conceptual consciousness. So if you could look at somebody and see how they were changing every moment you'd be seeing them as an ultimate reality ultimate truth, you'd be seeing ultimate truth and that would also be a direct perception. Now, I've just parenthetically for now and it can be opened up later parenthetically mentioned that actually when we look at people all day long there actually is a direct perception of them and there actually is the impermanence the subtle impermanence of them is being presented to the consciousness all day long. That we're engaging with the subtle impermanence with this rapidly changing quality of every person we meet we're meeting the ultimate truth at the same time and the way it's presented to our consciousness

[63:45]

is just like we engage just as we engage people's momentary subtle impermanence we also know that but very few people are aware of that. In other words, very few people are aware of the direct perception that's going on. They don't realize it. We don't realize it. And then the next part is very important too and this relates to the three wisdoms and this relates to studying various schools and that is that the direct perception of the subtle impermanence of ultimate truths which are ordinary things it may be necessary there's some different opinion on this but many people understand that it may be necessary

[64:45]

or is necessary that we first have a conceptual understanding of the subtle impermanence before we can directly realize the subtle impermanence. So we need to work with conceptual consciousness working with conventional truths in order to understand the subtle impermanence of ultimate truths or the subtle impermanence of all ultimate objects before we can actually have direct perception of the subtle impermanence of ultimate truths. Pardon? Just take mushrooms, yeah, right. Just take mushrooms. Well, just that the conceptual consciousness

[65:54]

is the one that's knowing the conventional truths like for example these images we have for chairs these generic images for chairs, we know those and also if we hear about the teaching of subtle emptiness or subtle impermanence we hear about that in conceptual consciousness so we have a generic version of subtle impermanence and then we work with these teachings about subtle impermanence until we have through conceptual discursive activity and study and examination in the conceptual realm, we have a wisdom which understands through hearing and through critical analysis using conceptual consciousness and understanding a wisdom, a kind of wisdom about this subtle impermanence a wisdom about what an ultimate truth is in this system, we have a wisdom about that but this wisdom is a conceptual is a conceptual cognition, wisdom.

[66:59]

In other words, we don't actually we're not actually looking at the ultimate truth we're not actually looking at the subtle impermanence because we're in conceptual consciousness but we need to do that work that's why it's proposed that we need to do the first two kinds of wisdom work before we can have the direct cognition, the direct perception of these truths and so there's some debate about that, some people maybe think well no, you can just be walking along the street and have a direct so like, is it really that when you take mushrooms that you're having a direct perception and maybe it is, maybe the chemistry like up-chucks the direct perceptions that are going on all day long that we can't see because our conceptual consciousness is so overbearing that it like makes it so we don't notice these direct perceptions

[68:03]

that are going on maybe so so so maybe that's enough, I mean that's that gives you a start on this school I think so you probably have two or three hours of questions and it's already it's kind of interesting stuff, kind of surprising change in perspective on this yes yes sensory experiences are direct perceptions, yes let's see, what's the difference again, looking at the four foundations of mindfulness so when you first start being mindful of the body okay, there's two kinds of cognitions

[69:06]

that you could have of the body okay, so in this kind of cognition you have mindfulness and you're paying attention to the body but what you're mindful of perhaps in this situation is of a generic body okay, and even if you get into subtleties about the body still you're having the generic version of whatever you're dealing with so then in that case you're meditating on the samanya lakshanas the general characteristics of the phenomena called body that you're looking at, or the aspect of body that you're looking at you're practicing mindfulness in a conceptual way that's part of the deal it's part of developing wisdom through mindfulness is using the conceptual consciousness simultaneously there is perceptual consciousness going on too or you know, alternating between it in some way or simultaneously it's perceptual consciousness

[70:07]

perceptual consciousness is more subtle and it's about subtler things but it's not about the generic version of the subtle things it's actually seeing the subtlety of impermanence rather than the general characteristic of impermanence so that would be also characteristic in this school you would use mindfulness and you would apply it but you have the additional teaching about these two kinds of consciousness or this particular take on it such that whereas previously the jug was said to be a conventional truth because as you analyze it if you break it physically the consciousness ceases now we're saying the jug, the same thing is an ultimate truth but it doesn't really necessarily contradict the previous one because when they said before that when the jug is broken the consciousness ceases what kind of consciousness was that that ceases?

[71:08]

it was a conceptual consciousness but they didn't say that but in fact now we see maybe that's what it was because in this case too if you have a conceptual consciousness looking at a jug and you break the jug, the conceptual consciousness will cease right? so it's being involved with the object in that way the conceptual consciousness continues the conceptual consciousness will continue if you break the thing? no, it's not that bad if you go into a furniture store and there's no furniture in it you won't start seeing furniture but if you break the furniture in either school you'll see the broken furniture it's just that if you have a conceptual consciousness

[72:10]

in either school, but the first school didn't mention it if you have a conceptual consciousness of the chair and the chair is broken that conceptual consciousness won't go on you won't continue to imagine the chair now in your head you might imagine a chair but there's no chair there, there's no chair existing when you just close your eyes and imagine a chair but there is the image of the chair so we use fancy examples like a furry turtle but you could also just imagine a chair in your mind and then people say but there's some chair that corresponds but actually there's no chair that corresponds to the image you have in your mind of a chair there's no chair like that but there is the conventional truth of the image of the chair in your mind however if you look at something outside and in dependence on that you engage with that and then you make a generic version of that and know that generic version then if they break the chair in front of you

[73:11]

usually you would give up that the chair is still there some people try, you know like little kids try to keep seeing their grandpa after he's dead but they do get disturbed, usually that's conceptual consciousness so this would agree that conceptual consciousness knows conventional truths whereas if you knew, if you looked at the jug and saw see how these schools are related if you looked at the jug and saw at a direct perception and saw the impermanence of the jug and then the jug was broken this would not be news to you does that make sense? if anybody doesn't understand if you have any doubts, stop right there because that's kind of, I think, a good point yes? excuse me, could you wait on that question

[74:21]

could you wait a second on your question I'd like to stay with this pot thing, this jug thing okay, a little longer can you see that if you look at a jug and you come up with a generic version of the jug and then the jug breaks is broken physically that you might give up on that generic version of a jug as being what's out there that the consciousness of it would cease except if you wanted to play some fancy, you know, be silly okay, can you see that? you can still imagine it, but you wouldn't think that it was a jug if I hold a jug up to you and then put it behind my back you can still imagine it, but you don't think what you're imagining is the jug you probably wouldn't most people wouldn't think that that was the jug the jug's behind my back you're imagining the jug, that's an image in your mind but if I hold the jug up to you and you look at the jug and you engage with that jug

[75:23]

and then you have what you think is the jug in your mind if it's a conceptual consciousness you're really looking at a concept of this jug now if I break the jug, you're not going to continue to think that that thing exists initially, you're going to think that's over now I'm looking at these shards of course, you're doing a conceptual, generic version of the shards but that consciousness ceases you see, there's a relationship between these two schools that one's getting a little bit more sophisticated, you see the difference? it's really not contradicting, it's just more sophisticated the previous school, they didn't say they didn't mention that the consciousness was just apprehending the pot and that ceases when the pot is broken that that's a conceptual consciousness that ceased they didn't mention that now the second school, you can see that's what ceased see how that's a kind of a refinement

[76:25]

of the epistemology of the event but what I was trying to lead up to which I thought was really important conceptually was that if you had a direct perception of the pot you would be seeing, moment by moment its destruction because you'd be tuned into the subtle impermanence so then if a gross impermanence manifested you wouldn't lose your consciousness because you're not tuned into the grossness of the object, you're not turned into the generic version of it so the generic version wouldn't be destroyed because you're not even dealing with it so breaking the pot would fit in with what you're seeing now how that would work would be that you would get into the subtle impermanence of the breaking of the pot does that make sense? I know that was hard maybe, and you'd get into the subtle impermanence of the broken pot you'd even see that the broken pot was impermanent the shards were impermanent, you'd watch the shards

[77:27]

changing moment by moment isn't that kind of interesting? like usually when we look at a pot we think okay, I can see how maybe that but I don't see how the pot's changing every moment then you break the pot, you don't expect to see how the broken pot's changing every moment you know the pot can be broken but it's hard for you to see how a broken pot can be broken but in fact the broken pot is constantly being broken when it's an ultimate truth an ultimate truth is a subtle impermanence so when you're looking at things and seeing their impermanence then when they're destroyed you don't lose that consciousness isn't ceased, so the criterion of the first example actually applies to the second doesn't really violate it as far as I would see so far does that make sense? now Steven do you want to do your thing about America? well, no, I think that's Chan Chah's thing about this glass

[78:28]

when he says, for me, this whole glass he says, for me, the glass is already broken there you go, that's interesting, huh? the Zen teacher's holding a glass and says, for me the glass is already broken oh, Theravada, I'm sorry sounded kind of like a Chinese name subtle impermanence involves all different frequencies the subtle impermanence of that vase behind you is very different than the subtle impermanence of a person yes, it's very different and when you see the subtle impermanence of the pot and you see the subtle impermanence of the person then you also see, what? what? well, maybe, but you see the specific characteristics of the pot and the person too so that goes along with it, that the richness of the particular thing you're looking at is available to you in direct perception, direct perception is like very rich it's going on all the time, but we're generally cut off from it

[79:29]

because of the dominance of conceptual consciousness because conceptual consciousness is like heavy metal versus like organic dyes you know, it's very subtle the difference between each thing and you're into that subtlety of how they change and you're into the specific characteristics of each thing within this school within this direct perception as presented by this school so it's a wonderful thing, direct perception is a wonderful thing and it knows ultimate truth and it knows subtle impermanence and it knows the richness of life seeing the richness of life goes along with seeing the ultimate truth and subtle impermanence and conceptual consciousness is very vivid and powerful and dominant and kind of like blows perceptual consciousness into obscurity and oblivion for most of the time

[80:30]

but it's also in some sense reduces the subtlety and the richness of experience and also presents us with false appearances false existences okay, so there's lots of questions yes, Karen? in terms of the direct perception how specific is it if I'm seeing light and color and shapes and if I go further and I can't really perceive atoms so if I go further well then it goes into conception maybe so, but my first response as you were starting to talk was that instead of specific another one is unique so the unique quality of whatever

[81:34]

the thing your mind's engaged with that is known, that's what's being looked at it's the unique quality, you don't necessarily have to analyze or anything it's just the unique way that this is it's not really what the thing is it's the unique way the thing touches you it's the way you're actually touched by the thing without then converting that touch that specific unique impact into a concept so you don't have to do anything all you have to do is like accept it basically it's already there however, again the funny thing is and if it's a truth if it's a conventional truth that we're looking at now I mean an ultimate truth that truth is known to that consciousness and it's going on all day long actually we're taking an ultimate truth all day long but we don't realize it

[82:34]

both because conceptual consciousness dominates and also because we haven't trained the mind by using conceptual consciousness in some sense to think itself out of being an obstruction so conceptual consciousness then works on this until it understands and then conceptual consciousness checks out for a while then we go into Samadhi and the fruit of conceptual consciousness the fruit of discursive thought appears to us in this space of giving up conceptual thought and giving up discursive thought it appears in this realm of direct perception we're tuning into direct conception but we need to have educated ourselves so we realize again using a drug example sometimes people take drugs and they say well I don't feel anything somehow you have to tell them how stoned they are and then once you tell them they say oh I see, wow, oh jeez you know so did you notice, look over there

[83:37]

does that look the same, oh my god so you sort of have to train yourself to what to watch for so that when you're in the realm of direct perception you don't miss it because actually it's going on all day long because direct perception is the kind of perception that arises when a color is presented to the eye and this consciousness arises so the things that stimulate the birth in other words functional things that can be the cause of the arising of an eye consciousness because they actually work with the eye and the eye consciousness, those things, those kinds of things are ultimate truths in this system so actually that kind of thing is going on all day long but then those direct perceptions are being converted and interpreted and finally confused with the generic concept which turns out often applies quite well because we've worked this out pretty well it applies quite well, the color red does apply

[84:39]

to the actual physical impact of electromagnetic radiation of a certain type on the eye which creates this impression there is that going on, so we have it so we need to train ourselves in these two levels of wisdom first of all before we have the third level of wisdom conjoined with the samadhi of direct perception and this school is like in some sense I think elucidating the process in a kind of helpful way it seems like it's not really in contradiction to the previous one but actually deepening and giving more access to what the previous one was saying but didn't say quite as well so again on the C there's I'll call on some people that haven't been called on yet Cathy? consciousness consciousness consciousness, cognition, knowing

[85:42]

awareness, pretty much in English these words are used often as synonyms sometimes they even say main mind because the mental factors like samadhi and so on are often sometimes called minds but really they could also be considered concomitants to the main mind the total cognition does that answer your question? is that their definition? whose definition? the Vaibhashikas, yeah the Vaibhashikas, it's theirs but you know, they're the earliest ones so their definition holds up pretty well actually it's their understanding of the status of these dharmas nobody's like going in and saying no, no, we don't have like consciousness and samadhi all the schools say yes, there's this big consciousness

[86:42]

and then there's samadhi and intellect and mindfulness and what do you call it, volition and contact pretty much the ingredients of the situation are agreed upon but the status of this phenomenon is what's being discussed what's the ultimate truth and what's the conventional truth and what's the relationship between them, this is the debate but the actual structure of the consciousness and how it works there's not so much debate in some cases a subtlety is being raised to the surface which was there before but not articulated does that answer your question? actually you look like it wasn't answered well are objects considered external in these schools? yes, well they're not considered external they're asserted as external

[87:45]

no, they're considered external and they're asserted as true they're accepted as truly existent in both these schools however in the realist school what is seen is assumed to be the same as what's out there in which school? in the vaibhashikas you see the jug and it's assumed that the jug that's out there is the same as the jug you see but it's not the same what's not the same? the one-pointedness the one-pointedness of the no the one-pointedness of mind and object is called samadhi the object is the object the subject is the subject and the one-pointedness of them is samadhi but that's agreed upon in all the schools too

[88:46]

but some schools say they're going to say that this external object doesn't truly exist and the naive realist will say the way it actually is is the way it appears this school would say that the way it actually is and the way it appears to conceptual consciousness not the same the way it appears and the way it actually is engaged are not the same but in direct perception then the way it appears and the way it's engaged is the same see the difference? between the two schools in all cases samadhi is the state of affairs there's no discrement there they all agree that all states of consciousness will be characterized by the subject and object being one-pointed it's external but not separate

[89:53]

or it appears as external but it's not separate they don't say it's separate because of samadhi but they're saying that in the mind the mind is characterized by one-pointedness of object known and knowing object known and knowing are one point that's a characteristic of the mind but they're also saying that there's something out there but in the mind what you know and what's known your knowing and what's known are one-pointed but they both say that there's something out there that engages with your body engages with your senses and gives rise to sense consciousnesses they both say that

[90:55]

in that sense they're both realist schools they're both saying there's something out there separate from the person but in the mind you have the opportunity to not be upset about that by practicing samadhi did you hear that? it didn't sink in very deeply well it just doesn't make sense to me it doesn't make sense to me if you have something out there yes I just said you understand in the mind that what you're dealing with now is when you know something, that thing you know is in your mind this is the one-pointedness in your mind it's a characteristic of your mind that the object known and the knowing are one-pointed and that's samadhi and if you deal with that, accept that and cultivate that

[92:00]

you feel calm, but the school still says that there's something out there it's not just that the mind is coming up with images and knowing them and one-pointed with them there's actually something out there stimulating the system the body but in samadhi the samadhi quality of mind does not think that there's an external object it's not thinking that it is simply the fact of the one-pointedness of mind and object that's the fact and when that's appreciated, you're calm but even though you're calm, you can still go to a school which says that there are external objects those external objects then touch the person through the organs at the organs this touching creates a consciousness of that object but the consciousness of that object is of something in the mind

[93:03]

it's an object in the mind that the mind knows and they're one-pointed no it's not different same one-pointedness of objects it's just that in the Yogacara they're saying that there's nothing out there there's no external object they seem to be literally saying that there's not an external object and since you're asking all these questions I'm going to take revenge by telling you about the next two systems and that is and that is simply in this regard the Yogacara says and that is and that is

[93:56]

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