And our gratitude for the very wholehearted devotion to the practice that this group of people has realized, even though there are some difficulties. We also, so far have not had much illness. I hear a little bit of coughing starting. But in one of the past practice periods we had here, almost everybody got sick. And so we've had now about almost 10 days of just a few coughs. By the way, we have a

[01:03]

a kind of etiquette that's in the center, and it seems to, some doctors think it's a pretty good one, when you cough, not to just cough out into the room, also not even put your hand on your mouth, but to cough, to put your head down and cough into your, sort of into your elbow, into your robe, I saw some people are doing. Does that make sense? Do you agree Ray? Yeah, I'd also include don't touch your face unless you absolutely have to and avoid doorknobs.

[02:13]

That's why hospitals did away with doorknobs many years ago. Use your elbow to open a hospital doorknob. But don't use the inside of your elbow. In the first two pages of this chapter on yoga, the questions of Maitreya, in the Chinese translation the chapter is called Analysis of Yoga, that's the name of the chapter in Chinese. So in the beginning, the analysis is just four types of objects.

[03:28]

One type of object is an object that doesn't have any images to reflect on. You're looking at something, but there's no images around it that you're reflecting on. And that type of object as tranquility. Another kind of object is an object that is accompanied by images for reflection. And that type of object is an object that one uses to develop insight. And then phenomena, the actual whole reality of all types of phenomena. It's not necessarily object by object, it's just that all types of objects are understood with the combination of these two.

[07:08]

And there's no limit to what these can understand. They understand all conventional and ultimate things. But then they separate this one special thing, and there's probably some reason for that. And as I mentioned to you, if you want to look at what that thing is, it's on page 1, 205 of this chapter in the Tibetan Translation from Tibetan. Now did you say you had the four yoga practices or yoga? Four objects. There's four objects of the four things that are objects of yoga practices, and the yoga practices that are being taught are basically the yoga practice of tranquility, the yoga practice of insight, and the yoga practice which is uniting the two, and when actually when those two are united it's called shamatha vipassana yoga ananda.

[08:19]

So when Samatha and Vipassana are joined in blissful union, that's the yoga practice that's also spoken of in the beginning of this chapter. It's called Yogananda. I don't know if it says it right here, but it's called Samatha-Vipassana-Yoga-Yogananda. Ananda. Ananda means bliss in this case. So, the blissful union of shamatan and vipashyana, that's when it says how many things are objects of both? All knowable things are objects of both. So both can look at the things which are But the things that are object of Vipassana are not the same as the things that are object of Samatha.

[09:29]

But when they're united, then everything can be their knowledge and also their happiness. And then it says, after introducing that, Maitreya says, abiding in and depending upon these four objects, bodhisattvas... no, excuse me, objects of observation, so Samatha and Vipassana, how do bodhisattvas seek Samatha? Because when you look at an object, you're often looking at an image of the object.

[14:31]

So if you look at an object and you're also looking at the image of the object, you don't reflect on the image of the object, and in that way you're actually looking at the mind which is contemplated by any mind. What does any mind mean? It means all the different minds, all the different states of dualistic consciousness, which you've ever had, and also non-dual consciousness, you're looking at the same mind all the time, but the mind appears as different objects. When you look at objects, the mind appears as different objects, and in conceptual cognition, the mind which appears as different objects is apprehended through images. when you don't reflect on the images that you're using to apprehend the object which is the mind appearing as an object you enter into tranquility but you're actually contemplating always the same mind and you realize that in a sense when you don't reflect on the images or when the images that come with the

[15:55]

that are part of your experience of an object, you don't reflect on them, in fact you're realizing contemplation of the mind which contemplates all minds. So contemplating all minds in some sense means the mind which is contemplating how all minds appear as different objects. So focusing on the breath or on the body would be insight meditation? No, if you focus on the breath, not focus on the breath so much, but if you choose to practice mindfulness of body, so you have this frame of reference of the body, so in particular you're watching the body, you assign yourself that thing, so the bodily objects arise, And if you see those objects and don't reflect on them, on the imagery around the object, or imagery as the object, that's tranquility.

[17:07]

If you examine, if you look at the object and examine to see what it is, then you're doing insight. So, actually in the early text, what is it, Digha Nikaya 22, The Mahasatipatthana Sutta, the great foundation of mindfulness, the first part of it, the beginning of setting the foundation of mindfulness, looks to me to be a Samatha practice, but then it moves into another phase where you start looking at the object and see how it relates to various conditions, then you switch to So, to look at the breath and then don't get involved in reflecting on any of the images of the breath or around the breath, which means you don't reflect on the images of the breath, like how the breath itself appears, you don't reflect on that, you don't think about that.

[18:18]

But also, you don't reflect on any other images around the breath, like stories about the breath or not about the breath, you don't get involved in any reflective imagery in relationship to the breath, it's just in the breath as the breath, that's it. That way of being with the breath establishes mindfulness and also establishes tranquility. But then if you start looking at what is the breath? How does it arise? How does it cease? What are its conditions? So it says in the sutra, in the early sutra it says, watching the origin and ceasing of whatever, some bodily function, some bodily appearance, that moves into a decautional level. Does that make sense? Yes? When you talked yesterday about the, I guess it was kind of like, I can't remember the words you used, like wrong understanding or like a tainted

[19:19]

In other words, if you jump into the Vipassana side... Excuse me, I think what you're referring to is that I said that even if you are looking at some phenomena called the breath and if you give up reflecting on any imagery accompanying the breath and you enter into tranquility after doing that for a while, you still may have some misconceptions which are accompanying the breath, which were there at the beginning of the meditation and have not been removed. You also have some conceptions of breath which aren't misconceptions, perhaps, like for example, that its breath isn't a misconception. In charmative practice you're not messing with the conceptions, and some of the conceptions we have about things are misconceptions. we conceive on the breath as having some independent existence.

[20:36]

That's a misconception. In the footnotes of the chapter 8, it talks about the... So my question is really about, if you jump If you jump into Vipassana, it's decided too fast. That's a kind of trippy question in itself, because if you mean by too fast, do you mean before you have tranquility? No, before there's all the misconceptions... Excuse me, right there. Almost no one is going to move into Vipassana before the practice to remove the misconceptions.

[21:40]

So we're born with the misconceptions. So as we move into tranquility practice and vipassana practice, we move into vipassana practice to abandon these misconceptions. So when we first start vipassana practice, and even for a while after, we still entertain these misconceptions. So isn't that at the very beginning of training in vipassana, or becoming skillful in vipassana at the beginning, we're not skillful enough at vipassana to overcome misconceptions. But it still can be real vipassana if we're tranquil. So in some sense, moving into vipassana too soon would be, number one, because you're not tranquil enough, and number two, because you don't have your vipassana instructions properly established. Those would be the two ways you're going to sue. So usually you get instruction in Vipassana before you start practicing Samatha, but you could also practice Samatha and then get instruction in Vipassana, and then with the Samatha and the instructions in Vipassana you start practicing Vipassana.

[22:57]

But through this whole process, sentient beings still have misconceptions about whatever they're But by applying Vipassana, especially by uniting Vipassana and Samatha, you come to what is going to be happening in a couple more lines, namely a correct understanding of the way things are, which will overthrow the deeply established tendency to see things in a misconceived way. which is the shamatha. Abandoning non-conceptuality means abandoning the training in shamatha, yes. Okay, and the non-conceptuality is the discursive thought around? No, non-conceptuality is giving up the discursive thought. So in shamatha you're training yourself to be non-conceptual about

[23:59]

you know, whatever object you're being conceptual about. So usually when we start training in Samatha we're at the level of conceptual cognition. So we're dealing with objects in terms of images of them. We're apprehending objects through images of them. And so you're in a class in Berkeley where we've made this point which is very difficult and so I'm going to say it now. In conceptual cognition, when an object appears to us, we apprehend the object by means of an intervening or mediating image or concept. That's how we have conceptual cognitions. And we confuse the two. So conceptual cognitions are basically mistaken because we can't tell the difference between the image by which we apprehend something, like the breath, or the posture, and the breath and the posture.

[25:08]

The actual object of the breath is confused with the image of the breath. So in that level we're mistaken. And in that level of conceptual cognition where we're mistaken about the body and the breath, in that way In other words, we're mistaken about what is appearing to us. What's appearing to us is the image, but we mistake the image that's appearing to us for the object which is actually the basis of the image. Still, it's in that realm that we're hearing the instructions about how to practice shamatha, and the instructions are, this object or this image or this concept which you're meditating on, now don't be discursive about that, be non-discursive, be non-conceptual about this concept. and then you'll calm down. Then when you're calmed down, then you can start using vipassana to not only understand the mistake you're making in terms of conceptual cognition, but you can also understand another misconception, which is that the object has inherent existence and exists separate from the mind.

[26:15]

I have lots of questions, but I think it would be good to go a little further in the text. Actually, I think I should go a little further if you take this big, huge bite that's coming up. So this is the shamatha. Then the apasana, having obtained this pliancy, this shamatha, and abiding only in that state, you're abiding in the state which is the result from the training. having abandoned certain aspects of mind, and the way I understand that is you're abandoning now being non-discursive, you're abandoning the Samatha training. It's like you've launched yourself into tranquility and then you abandon the training which puts you there, like a rocket, you know, those booster rockets, they go up and then they drop the lower one, so you're in this state of being lifted into the sky,

[27:22]

but you're not holding on to the booster anymore. It's like that. So you abandon that thing that got you in the state, for a while anyway. And then in this state of tranquility, they analyze and inwardly consider those doctrines in the way that they had been contemplated as images which are the focus of Samadhi. So these doctrines are still images. you're still looking at the images of the doctrine, so still conceptual cognition. However, it's operating in, number one, tranquility, and number two, you're reactivating the discursive thought to analyze the images by which the teaching has come to you. And then we move into this next phase, which is, this is how Bodhisattvas The differentiation, the thorough differentiation, the thorough investigation, the thorough analysis, forbearance, interest, discrimination, view, investigation of these objects that are known with respect to the images that are the focus of the samadhi is vipassana.

[28:43]

It may be that during this retreat we'll go into all those different aspects, but they're going into the details now of the analysis of the image. by which the teaching or the doctrine has come to you. All these things, you know, the differentiation, the thorough differentiation, the thorough investigation, the thorough analysis, the forbearance, interest, discrimination, view, investigation, all those are aspects of your dispersive analysis, of your conceptual analysis, of your reflection on the images about the teachings, and that's the And we may go into those different aspects, but in short, you can just say you're reflecting thoroughly, and many different aspects are reflecting on the teaching, but this is at a conceptual level also, but you're also calm. That was a big bite there too, but there's an even bigger one coming, I want to go a little further.

[29:51]

This is how Bodhisattva's become skilled in vipassana. And then here comes the big thing, okay? Bhagavan, prior to the attaining of physical and mental pliancy, this is the big thing, this is important, but prior to attaining the physical and mental pliancy, when Bodhisattvas inwardly attend to the mind observing the mind, okay, the mind observing the mind, what kind of training is that? So you're looking at objects, breath, posture, sound of a bird, pain in your leg, you're looking at those objects, but you're actually training the mind to observe the mind at that time, and you're observing the mind to watch, to see if the mind doesn't reflect on the images there. And it says, prior to attaining this physical and mental pliancy, what is that kind of training called?

[30:59]

It's not shamatha. But it resembles intensified interest concordant with Samatha, which is a kind of bulky way to say it's really the training in Samatha, which of course is in accordance with it. But it's not actually Samatha. Samatha, for whatever reason, is speaking of the result of the training. But it's the training inwardly attending to the mind, observing the mind. You're watching the mind, which contemplates all minds. And prior to pliancy it's not Samatha, but it's still, if you're doing this correctly, it's still the right thing to do for Samatha's sake. And I wrote this little note in here, practicing with the trust, guiding one to concentration and contemplation.

[32:15]

So to some extent you're betting, you're putting down your bet that this would be a good way to use your mind, to spend time giving up discursive thought for the sake of developing concentration and of course based on that insight. And then Maitreya says, Bhagavan prior to attaining mental and physical appliancy when the Bodhisattva inwardly attends to those doctrines just as they have been contemplated as images that are the focus of Samadhi, what is this called? And the Buddha says, this is not Vipassana, however it resembles intensified interest concordant with vipassana. So it could be the same type of discursive thought, basically, quite similar to the same type of analysis that you'd be doing if you were tranquil, but it's not vipassana.

[33:21]

So this is a big deal about this book, because this book is saying vipassana is done in a state of tranquility. I think I didn't get that one. This sutra is saying that vipassana, insight work, is done in the state of tranquility. But still, you can learn teachings which are contemplated in tranquility as vipassana work. You can study those same teachings, but studying them before you're in tranquility is not vipassana. And practicing analysis of your experience based on those teachings before you're in state of tranquility, according to this sutra, is not yet shamatha, but it's similar. It's not yet vipassana, but it's similar to vipassana. It looks like it. The mind seems to be operating the same way, but it's in a different world. It's in a different world.

[34:24]

Is that what we're doing now? Yes. Most people start right now, perhaps not really in a state of tranquility, And we're hearing these teachings about how to practice tranquility and insight. And we're also hearing other teachings, which would eventually be the teachings which we would be contemplating just as we learn them, but in a state of tranquility, later. So here's the big one, and I think it's coming in now. Here it is. And then he says, Bhagavan, are the path of Samatha and Vipassana different or not different? Bhagavan replied, Maitreya, although they are not different, they are not the same. Why are they not different? Because Samatha observes mind, which is the object of observation of Vipassana.

[35:29]

We know it's observing the mind which contemplates all minds, but all the objects that Samatha is studying, all the images, are also mind. So in that way they're not different. Samatha observes mind which is also the object of observation of vipassana. Why are they not the same? because Vipassana observes conceptual images. Bhagavan, what is the image, the focus of the samadhi which perceives an image? Bhagavan, what is the image, the focus of samadhi which perceives the image? Is it different from mind or is it non-different? So if you're looking at an image of an object, which is the focus of samadhi, is it different from mine or not different?

[36:40]

Buddha says, Maitreya, it's not different. He doesn't say it's different. He says it's not different. Why is it not different? Because the image is simply cognition only. mind only, cognition only, concept only. Would you say that again, please?

[38:06]

I'll try. In Samatha. Are you talking about in training in Samatha or in the state of Samatha? In the state of Samatha. Yeah? Is there an awareness mind, which is difficult for me to say because it's difficult for me to say, but an awareness mind, and which is things come and go without any kind of conceptual conception about them. which is observing whatever kind of, which is observing whatever you're experiencing.

[39:16]

You're actually looking at your mind, by not getting involved in discoursing about the images through which the mind is processing. That's a training. So once you're completely tranquil, you can continue to train in tranquility. That's the perfect world. But this text is also saying, in fact, it's useful. It's a good question. But the way you do that is you put aside the training of meditating on the mind, which is the mind that comes first. It's the same thing. The mind that comes first. So, in Samatha, you're contemplating the mind which doesn't contemplate any object. In this text, you're contemplating the mind. No phenomenon appears to be a phenomenon.

[42:19]

In other words, no phenomenon apprehends another phenomenon. No mind apprehends some other phenomenon from mind. Nevertheless, the mind that is generated in that way appears to For instance... The form and the appearance of the image appear as different sexualities, but are not different sexualities.

[43:36]

Likewise, the mind is generally, in that way, Samadhi also appears as a separate form of sexuality. of sentient beings and so forth, which abide in the nature of images of mind, not different from mind. And of course, Buddha says, Maitreya, they are not different. However, childish beings with distorted understanding do not recognize these images as cognition only, just as they are in reality.

[44:39]

They misconstrue them. Bhagavan, at what point do Bodhisattvas solely cultivate vipassana? So in a sense we're going back to the earlier thing where he says, how do they cultivate vipassana? And Bhagavan says, when they attend to mental signs with continuous mental attention. So when you're practicing vipassana by itself you're actually meditating on mental signs, on images. Okay? Does that sound familiar? Can you give an example? Well, like I'm looking at you, and if I'm doing the apostinate, I have images of you, and I actually contemplate the image, I reflect on the image. And now I'm getting more information. The image I'm reflecting on is like a sign, which means that I'm reflecting on an image which has the appearance of being a substantial thing separate from me. If apostinate, I would not reflect on the images,

[45:43]

by which I apprehend. I'm in a state of conceptual cognition in either case. So in Vipassana, I'm not going to reflect on the images by which I apprehend you and know you. In Vipassana, I will reflect on it, and not only that, but I'm going to reflect on its signs. In Vipassana, I am going to reflect on those images. And in particular, these images are going to be our mental images that are signs, and signs mean an image which has some sense of some separate substantial existence. So it isn't just that I have like a fleeting image of you which I don't really know, I'm not really sure if it's me or you. It's like I'm really pretty sure it's you, not me, or me, not you, or yours, not mine. And it really is that way. to work with that kind of stuff is the job of imagining substantial entities.

[46:52]

So in Vipassana you're actually studying delusion. You're studying the images of substantial existences. Along with teachings they're telling you that that's wrong. At what point do they solely cultivate Samatha? You know, back to a similar but slightly different statement. When they attend to the innermost mind, excuse me, to the unerupted innermost mind with continuous mental attention. That's kind of a repeat, right? And then, this is what I was going to, related to what we were talking about a minute ago. At what point, having combined the two, Samatha and Vipassana, do they unite them? when they mentally attend to the one-pointedness of mind. At that point, it's Shamantan, Vipassana, or united. That's not the one. And then, what are the mental signs?

[48:00]

Maitreya, they are the conceptual images which are the focus of Samadhi, but he doesn't tell us that they also carry with them the sense of substantial existence. It doesn't say that this time. They are the conceptual images that are the focus of samadhi, which are the objects of vipassana. So when a samadhi is looking at conceptual images, reflecting on those, those conceptual images are the focus of the vipassana in the samadhi. And what is the uninterrupted mind, Maitreya? It is the mind that observes the image, the object of observation of Samatha. So Samatha is looking at the object which is the uninterrupted mind, the Paschen is looking at the uninterrupted mind seen as a mental sign.

[49:08]

What is the one-pointed mind? It is the realization that this image is the focus of samadhi. It's cognition only. This image, which is the focus of samadhi, is cognition only. That realization is one-pointed mind. Could you explain? I'm completely not understanding. Maybe I don't understand what samadhi means very well, but I don't even know where to begin. It seems to me that they're using samadhi in different cases. It sounds like they're using samadhi in the case where you're practicing tranquility, you've attained tranquility, and you're in a samadhi. And you can continue in that samadhi to meditate on whatever is happening, basically as the uninterrupted mind.

[50:28]

I'm in a samadhi situation, but I'm practicing shamatha, so you can practice shamatha in samadhi. What is samadhi? Well, the definition of Samadhi is one-pointedness of thought. That's its definition. It means to be gathered or concentrated. Samatha means to be at ease or calm. And Samatha is, in a sense, a type of Samadhi, or Samadhi is a type of Samatha. So why would the focus of Samadhi be an image? The focus of Samadhi being an image? Yeah, why is it an image? Well, in both cases, At this level, you're being initiated into this meditation, right? This is an initiation process here. And at the beginning, you have to get this stuff through your ear.

[51:31]

You have to get it through words. You're in a conceptual cognition mostly in your life. It's in conceptual cognition that we have our problems. It's in conceptual cognition that we have misconceptions that are the basis of our problems. So for people who are caught up in misconceptions about life, now conceptual teachings are coming to them. And the teaching is, now, what kind of objects are we going to teach these people? The first kind of object is an image unaccompanied by images for reflection. Unaccompanied. Unaccompanied. So we're talking about people who are in conceptual cognition, who are hearing the Buddha's teaching, or hearing the Bodhisattva's instruction, and the instruction is, if you look at what you're looking at, you're basically looking at images. Don't say that. Now, look at an image that you're having of an object, and see if you can look at that image without any

[52:37]

accompanying images that you're reflecting on. Another way to say it is, look at the image but actually look at it in such a way that you're looking at the uninterrupted mind. The uninterrupted mind is the mind which looks at all images. It's not the mind that's jumping around looking, reflecting on things. So in the Samatha, When you're training in Samatha, you're not yet in Samadhi. But if you continuously attend to this uninterrupted mind, it may come to fruit as Samatha. So now, if you wish to continue the same training of looking at images of objects without getting into any kind of discursive analysis or conceptual elaboration on the image, turning your imagination off after it's done its basic work of imaging a particular phenomenon.

[53:43]

Then you could deepen that trance deeper and deeper and deeper. Or you could look at the image and let there be some reflection on the image, and then you would shift into vipassana. Now the Vipassana is now looking at an image and reflecting on it, but we're still in a state of Samadhi in the sense that we're in a state of tranquility. So, the tranquil mind has this same object that the Vipassana mind has. Does that make sense? So we're in a state of Samadhi, and now we're going to do Vipassana work in the Samadhi. Vipassana work has the same object that the tranquility work would have, so the same object you can treat in such a way as to promote tranquility, or you can reflect on various images associated with it, and teachings about it, and analyze it, and develop insight.

[54:51]

And that object is an image? Object is an image. Because you're going to be using images, if you're cautious, you're going to be using images to reflect on objects that are images. You're in the imaging or imagination realm, where you can receive teachings, and apply teachings to objects which are images. Then the two can be united. And when they're united, then we create a yogic state which is identical to the teaching which we're going to contemplate. So there we're going to be like meditating on the object without conceptual elaboration, and we're going to be applying a teaching by which you reflect on the teaching through conceptual elaboration, a teaching which says that this image is nothing other than mind.

[56:00]

In other words, this image is free of any conceptual elaboration. It's not, at least if it's separate, from what knows it. So looking at how those two come together and being in the state of where those two come together is the realization, not just the hearing the teaching, but the realization of the teaching that whatever image appears to you is the mind appearing that way. So that's the big thing, that's the big teaching of this part of the sutra. Yeah. Is it similar to say seeing seeds, thoughts, thinking, I mean, thinking, having thoughts and like that's the way it appears in the mind. Say it again. I mean, the last few sentences you just shared with us is if I, I'm just checking if I understand it.

[57:03]

Instead of like I'm seeing something, it's more seeing is seeing. is an object in mind. There is a hearing, I mean, there is an image of something, and there is a hearing, and the hearing is hearing, the way it appears in the mind. The hearing is hearing, as opposed to I'm hearing some sound. Yes. Or thoughts are thinking. It's close, or another way to say it would be, the sound heard is nothing other than the awareness of hearing. Yes. When mind realizes that what's coming up is mind, where does that leave you? Where does it leave you? It feels kind of like, jeez, everything I'm saying is just my self-generating.

[58:04]

Is there something there that's... It's a little bit different from my self-generating. It's that whatever you're seeing is mind-generated. Yeah. So you want to know how to proceed from there? Yeah. I mean, where's the... Well, when you actually have that realization, again, you're now in a state where you're in a state of samadhi, where your state is like that, you know? Your state is like that and you're realized like that. Then you're starting to meditate on what we call, as it says, then you're starting to meditate on suchness. And now you're basically initiated into the meditation practice. And you just continue that meditation until you become a Buddha. This is the initiation into, if you excuse the expression, Buddha's meditation. Before that you're not really doing Buddha's meditation, you're just basically getting ready for it. Because you're still seeing things, you still see things and kind of believe things are separate before this.

[59:06]

So you're just continuing to reiterate a misconception of the nature of your experience, plus you're maybe even agitated and upset too. But at this point, from here on it says, as it says in the next part, that at this point you're meditating on suchness, and by continually meditating on suchness you will progress along the Bodhisattva path. Yes? Just a follow-up. Mind is a sense organ. Mind's partly a sense organ. It has a sense organ part, but it's also an awareness, and the awareness isn't really an organ. It's a knowing. So then once you get to that mind knowing that what's arising is mind, there are awarenesses that we possess that we're unaware of because the mind gets annoyed?

[60:11]

That will take you into the Buddha from practice? It opens the door to other kinds of awareness which are blocked because we believe that objects are separate from mind, yes. And also kinds of other emotions that arise with the belief that objects are separate from mind, that block our vision of the way we actually are relating with other beings. And then we have earlier teachings in the sutra, and in particular I'm thinking of chapter 6 and 7, where they teach that the actual fundamental character of things is that they're interdependent or other-dependent. However, it also says there that When we look at the other dependent phenomena, we see it through conceptual imaging, so we see it in an afflicting way.

[61:14]

When you enter into Samadhi, you start to remove the superimposition over the way things actually are, and start dealing with reality in an unpackaged, non-conceptual way, or start dealing with your life free of conceptual clinging. through this kind of samadhi. So in the earlier chapters it proposes the possibility of seeing suchness and how that's important, and it points out in chapter 7 how our problems arise from our believing that our conceptual imagination of things is them, or that our problems arise from believing that our conceptual superimpositions on our interdependent life are actually our life. And this is a yogic practice to overthrow that belief in the superimposition of images upon our existence.

[62:17]

And it's a very extensive path of practice for the Bodhisattva. I have two. One is that I really want to bite or get into why this instruction has come to Maitreya and not Manjushri or one of the other bodhisattvas. Does this have to do with initiation? That's the first question. Yeah. I don't know if what I I don't know if the sutra that we've just been going through, plus the way I've been talking about it, comes across to you as a story or not, but it could. You could see what I just said and the sutra that I'm bouncing off of as a story.

[63:21]

So now, in a sense, your question could lead me to more stories. Paula asked me something about the history of this sutra, so I could tell you his story of this sutra. And I kind of feel like this sutra is a really good example of a teaching appearing in this world sometime now. It seems like in history it appeared maybe five to nine hundred years after the Buddha died. his teaching appeared in this form of cognition only. Where did it come from? And so the question of something which was just there about what about Maitreya? How come Maitreya is the one asking the questions in this chapter?

[64:27]

And I've already told another story about this bodhisattva who was, again, a bodhisattva who a lot of guys have a story about. A lot of his, a lot of he's have stories about this bodhisattva named Asanga. And somehow Asanga felt like Maitreya was who he needed to meet. He was trying to practice and he was having trouble practicing. He wasn't getting anywhere. And he somehow got the idea that the Bodhisattva Maitreya, the next Buddha, would be just the person he would need to meet. And Asanga, by the way, the most important sutra to Asanga seems to be this sutra here. This sutra revealing the intention of the Buddha. So there's something really important about Maitreya in this tradition of the sutra.

[65:34]

He's, in some sense, the most important chapter, in a way, is this chapter. And the most important bodhisattva for the founder of the Yogacara school, which is Maitreya, uses this text as the main text, main sutra. However, Maitreya has a bunch, excuse me, Asanga has a bunch of other scriptures which he wrote down, which he tells us were transmitted to him directly from Maitreya. So a big part of the history of this text and a big part of the teaching development of this text is that this text was made most influential through a historical person named Asanga. But this historical person named Ashtanga tells a story that he had a very close personal relationship with a celestial bodhisattva named Maitreya.

[66:39]

And that's the story. And we can go into more detail, but before we get into it, the question is, how do we understand the story of a supposedly historical person whose authority is, aside from the Buddha, unsurpassable in the Buddhist tradition. And he has this little brother named Vasubandhu who is also incredibly important in the history of the tradition. These two people who launched this Mahayana version of the understanding of mind. And Sangha is telling us that it's through divine inspiration or through divine revelation that he's able to write these amazing texts. And it seems to me that this text too, this sutra, is coming through divine revelation.

[67:52]

This sutra is coming, however, from the Buddha directly, whereas Sangha's works He's not getting from Buddha directly, he's getting from the Bodhisattva, Maitreya. And he also then studies the Sutra, which is coming from the Buddha, but he wasn't the one that the Buddha inspired to write the Sutra. And in this Sutra is this teaching, which is, where did it come from? Did human beings make it up? That could be a story you tell. Human beings made this up. But you could tell another story, is that human beings were touched, or reached, or entered, or human beings invoked and were met by celestial bodhisattvas and buddhas, in this case met by the Buddha. And it doesn't say Shakyamuni Buddha at the beginning of the sutra, does it? No. So we don't know what Buddha this is, that came to meet some human in India,

[68:58]

And in this face-to-face transmission between this Buddha and this person, you know, like the face-to-face transmission between, what, Moses and somebody else on a mountain? Or the face-to-face transmission between Abraham and somebody in Mecca? I don't know. These meetings between humans and divine beings, it seems to me, you could tell the story, that that happened between some being or some gang of beings, some gang of yogis in India. They were invited and were met by some Buddha who gave them this teaching about mind only. And Asanga got Maitreya to come to meet him. And Asanga uses this text and then he uses what Maitreya taught him to launch this meditation, and the sutra is like the main sutra, and the sangha's teachings are the main commentaries coming from Bodhisattvas.

[70:13]

So we don't call the teachings of the Bodhisattvas sutras. And not only that, but this story about where this sutra comes from is pretty much a direct reflection of the teaching we just were talking about, namely that the mind of sentient beings and the mind of Buddhas who come to stimulate them to give rise to a realization of Dharma, they're not separate, that human beings don't think up these teachings on their own. That's the story of this tradition. It's not that a Sangha made up those amazing things that he wrote down. He did write them down, but he was taking notes from his teacher, who happened to be a celestial bodhisattva. And he went to Tushita Heaven to receive the instruction.

[71:14]

And after he received these instructions and wrote down these five major texts, which are closely related to... Five major texts which reflect the view which we just read about. And the view is, from the point of view of the Heart Sutra, from the point of view that everything's empty, we teach that everything's mind. So first of all, all dharmas are empty, and the next teaching is, and the meaning of that is that all dharmas are mind only. And the bodhisattvas who taught that all dharmas are empty, they didn't make that up either, that was something that happened to them, to speak that way and write that way, because they had an interaction with the Buddha, or Buddhas, and then they said that all dharmas, just like Avalokiteshvara in the Heart Sutra starts saying that all dharmas are empty, but he's saying that while he's basically Buddha's mouthpiece, Buddha's in a samadhi animating Avalokiteshvara to tell us that all five skandhas are empty.

[72:29]

In this sutra, now, these Bodhisattvas and Buddhas are animating human beings to write down a story of different Bodhisattvas talking to Buddha and receiving these teachings and then writing them down for us. And then Maitreya, I mean, the Sangha actually writes commentaries they receive from Maitreya, and these commentaries are in accord with the teachings which he got from the sutra, which is again the teaching of emptiness, the perfect wisdom, in the form of teaching the nature of mind. And what is Buddha? These Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, they are a state free of conception, which is a compassion which wants to teach.

[73:38]

They are emptiness which wants to teach. And one of the ways they teach is they teach everything's empty. But now, at this point in history, given what was going on in India, one to four hundred, five hundred years after the The first wave of Mahayana teachings, the first wave of Mahayana teachings was beings were inspired, humans were inspired to say all dharmas are empty. All dharmas are free of conceptual clinging. All dharmas are free of any kind of conceptuality. That's what they taught. Now they're saying all dharmas are free of conceptuality means that whatever you're seeing is mind. It's the next wave. And that's because this great emptiness wants to teach beings. And it means if beings make clear that they want to be taught, these beings make contact and the face-to-face transmission occurs.

[74:41]

But the beings do not make this up. That's the story that I tell. The story arises between the beings, the beings who are not yet free of conceptual consciousness, clinging, and the beings whose compassion is not yet purified of any conceptual clinging, interacting with beings who are compassion, completely free of conceptual clinging. That union brings forth the wish to practice and the ability to somehow express these teachings, these new teachings, which have never been seen before but are necessary for the current historical situation. because the old ones are not necessarily as relevant as these new ones would be. And so these new ones were more effective and had more influence than the old ones did, even though the new ones could not have happened without the old ones' importance. So that's a story.

[75:44]

That's a story about where this sutra comes from and where the other texts Yes, we will. Is that why you said that the Dharma is not in the Sutra? That's related. I don't know if that's why I said that, but it's kind of saying the same thing. So the Dharma is not in the Sutra? No, but the Dharma causes the Sutra to arise. So, you know, actually, what is it? We have these three refuges, the three jewels, right? Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. And maybe it might be useful to post the Kyojikaimon.

[76:47]

So Dogen wrote a little essay called Kyojikaimon, which means essay on teaching and receiving the precepts. And tonight we're going to do a Bodhisattva ceremony, right? Traditionally, in Soto Zen, we read that Kyoju Kaimon, that essay of Dogen. In that essay, he says there's three virtues and three merits to the triple treasure. The first one is called the single-bodied triple treasure. The next one is called the manifested triple treasure, and the third one's called the maintaining triple treasure. The maintaining triple treasure means the triple treasure that's always changing and adapting to the present historical circumstances. And under that heading, the Dharma is written down on shells and leaves

[77:56]

and put into the storehouse. So, Dharma gets transformed into words written down on palm leaves, on shells, and paper, and now onto discs and cassettes and video screens. It gets transformed into these forms to help people. But the first level of Dharma, under the first triple treasure, The first treasure is unsurpassed, complete, perfect enlightenment, that's Buddha. The second treasure is purity and freedom from dust, that's the dharma. The dharma is purity and freedom from dust. Of what? Of what? Dust. Purity and freedom from dust is the dharma. Looking at the triple treasure under the heading of single body, triple treasure.

[79:01]

The Buddha is unsurpassed enlightenment, that's Buddha. It's not a person, it's the actual enlightened state. It's this freedom from all conceptual clinging which is full of compassion for beings, that's Buddha, that's unsurpassed enlightenment. The Dharma is purity and freedom from dust. Freedom from dust about what? The misconceptions are the dust. Freedom of misconceptions means freedom from dust. Dust means that when you see things it's like they get in your eye. In other words, to see things as objects we mean dust. So dharma is freedom from seeing things as objects. Freedom from dust means that everything you see is free from dust. Everything you see, especially Buddha, is free from the dust of it being out there.

[80:04]

And also when you see things, they're free of the idea that they're separate from your mind. Dust, impurity, is that you defile what is one by seeing it as two. That's the first kind of dharma. The first one is unsurpassed enlightenment, purity and freedom from dust, and the third one is peace and harmony. Not peace and harmony, it's the harmony of the previous two, that the Buddha and the freedom from dust is in perfect harmony, that's the third. And then the second one, the manifested triple treasure is the historical Buddha, that's the manifested triple treasure. the Dharma which the Buddha realized, that's it, the historical Dharma. And the people who study that are the historical Sangha. To maintain Buddha, the first one is actually people being edified, people waking up right now.

[81:13]

That's the Buddha. Us waking up, us being edified and being liberated, that's Buddha now. There's no historical Buddha here now anymore. But the third aspect of the triple treasure, the evolving, maintaining triple treasure, is us practicing and waking up. And the Dharma is the Dharma being transformed into whatever would be helpful. And the Sangha is peace and harmony in the world. So these are different meanings of Dharma. But the Dharma isn't in those things, but the Dharma can appear as those things, or cause the appearance of those things. And then people can look at those things and they can be told, Dharma is not in this thing. So this wonderful thing can appear and you go, wow, and you read it and it says, what you're holding is not it. Close the book and go out and help people. So, I'm trying to actually say that this tradition

[82:19]

is a teaching which comes from this deep and ancient sense that the actual teaching comes from the interaction between enlightened beings and unenlightened beings to make enlightened beings. This is another example of that, this teaching here. That's the history of this. But even when Buddha was alive, people maybe didn't understand that the transmission of the Dharma required meeting the Buddha. Maybe they think Buddha gave the teaching, and then people could go find the teaching, and then they'd study the teaching, and then understand the teaching. But that isn't what the teaching says. The teaching doesn't have stories too much. of people hearing about Buddha's teaching and becoming enlightened. The stories are about people hearing the teaching from the Buddha and becoming enlightened, because the transmission was not in what he was saying, but was in the meeting with the Buddha.

[83:33]

So this is a big issue about whether you can go pick up these Buddhist teachings and study them and understand the Dharma, but whether you have to actually, while you're studying these teachings, you have to actually have the Buddha come and meet you in order to be able to hear the Dharma while you're studying these teachings. And the Buddha meeting you is this practice, the meditative state you get into? Boy, you're talking about literally meeting the Buddha. Well, actually, that's something else you can get into. I'm talking about literally meeting the Buddha, I'm talking about not literally meeting the Buddha, and I'm talking about literally and not literally meeting the Buddha.

[84:35]

And those are the three types of insight, three types of wisdom. One type of wisdom is literal, Next type of wisdom is not literal. Third type of wisdom is both literal and not literal. First type of teaching depends on the word. Second type of teaching does not depend on the word. Third type of teaching, the deepest type, depends on the word and doesn't depend on the word. That's those three types of insight, which are discussed in the first two pages. And they're also discussed on page one, I think around 180 in the in the same chapter, and later too. There's three or four places in this chapter where there's three kinds of wisdom. Buddha is unsurpassed perfect enlightenment. Unsurpassed perfect enlightenment is a state of being that's free of conceptual clinging and full of compassion to teach people to wake up to that state and be free of suffering.

[85:38]

That's the answer past perfect enlightenment. But also Buddha can be a historical person. But also Buddha is when you wake up to the teaching. But you're waking up to the teaching, you don't do it by yourself. And I think a lot of people think that you can go and study Buddhism and wake up. You have to have a face-to-face meeting with the Buddha to wake up. A literal Buddha, not a literal Buddha. which can appear to you in a conceptual form, if you want to, but then you realize, oh, the Buddha isn't actually the image there. But nothing is actually the image there. So some people appear to you and say, hi, see the image? And you say, yeah. And you say, well, OK. Now, calm down. Give up any kind of elaboration on this image. And now analyze this image until you realize this image you're seeing is none other than your consciousness. And then you realize, oh, the person isn't the image. Of course, they never were.

[86:40]

But sometimes you need people to teach you that, or we need people to teach us that. Not sometimes. Actually, all the time when it comes to hearing the Dharma, you actually have to hear it by being in the company of the state that you want to realize. It's a transmission between the state of emptiness full of compassion to awaken the state of emptiness and full of compassion in another being, which in no way is separate from the previous one, but thinks that, entertains that misconception. So we feel separate from each other, and we feel separate from all of our objects. That's our misconception. So the face-to-face transmission goes really well with this teaching here. and that this teaching is coming through a face-to-face meeting between the disciples of Buddha who wrote down this tradition and the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas.

[87:47]

It isn't that these people who wrote down this tradition are not people who are walking around saying, you know, we made this up. They're people, like I say, who have some authority, like a Sangha. like Carlos Castaneda, he wrote those books. Do you know Carlos Castaneda? How many people don't know Carlos Castaneda? Anyway, he's a writer, he was an anthropologist and he wrote these books which some people say are novels and some people say that they're based on some actual experience he had with Native American shamans in Mexico. And some people say either he's really did meet a shaman, or he's a really great novelist. So, you know, I don't necessarily want to make a statement about him, although I do think he certainly, in some sense, if he's not authentically contacted these teachings, he is a really great novelist, I would say.

[89:02]

So I don't know which he is either, If a Sangha didn't meet Maitreya and he wrote the things he wrote without having... Then he's a great novelist. Then he's a person who wrote some of the most amazing teachings that have ever appeared in the world, who chose to tell us that he didn't write them. And then after he told us that, he just chose to tell us another story of his relationship with this Bodhisattva. And I don't think he said that to get people to believe what he said, because the texts speak for themselves. And he was a devotee of this text, this sutra. And the other people too, in the tradition, as it evolved after him, are very much concerned to make us understand how necessary it is for them to have a relationship with the authority of supremely enlightened Buddhas.

[90:19]

They really want us to understand how it is that Buddhas are authorities They want us to understand that, not just on belief, but actually understand how it makes sense that these are the most authoritative states of consciousness, states of being, and that they are disciples of these Buddhas and that they have this relationship with them. Yeah? one of these Buddhists to think that it's a totally ridiculous idea? Well, you can think that. That can be your understanding of the story, is that I think the story's ridiculous. It's a story, right? Until I actually experience it. I mean, it seems like until there is the experience, it's only an idea. Well, you can say idea, but it's a little bit more than an idea.

[91:25]

It's a story. It's a discursive idea. It's kind of an elaborate idea. So I would say story is a story or idea or imaginative tale. So you have these tales and you could say that they're ridiculous or whatever, far-fetched, unhelpful, all those things you could say, but that's what you say maybe at a given moment. And then later you might say something different. And then later you might say something different. And then you might say something different. My approach to various stories is that if I don't find them interesting or helpful, I just let them go for the time being. I don't feel like, okay, people say this is really an important story, so I should believe this story. I've never been that way. So that's the way I've been. That's my story, is that I have not forced myself to believe the stories

[92:29]

various stories I've heard in this portion of the Buddha Dharma. So that's fine. There's quite a few Zen stories. There are stories about people who go to see Zen teachers, and they say hi, and the teacher says hi, and they say, you know, I'm here to receive the teaching, and the teacher says something, and the guy thinks, really ridiculous." And then the guy walks out the door, you know, down the hill and walks and he says, Well, maybe I'm being a little hasty. Maybe it's just a cult up there. But I looked in the eyes of those other monks, and there was a thousand of them. Maybe that guy has some point to what he's saying. Maybe I should go back, give him another chance. He goes back up the hill and he says, what did you say again?

[93:30]

And then the guy says, I said, blah, blah.

[93:34]

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