ACI 15 «Что на самом деле имел в виду Будда», занятие 4

Class 4
Transcribed by: Karen Becker

(laughs) All right, unfortunately you had a a class off so you
probably forgot everything, so so did I. So, we'll we'll go over
everything again, okay. Basically this whole problem
started...the Buddha taught the Dharma three times...Three
Turnings of the Wheel, the three gate, great themes in his
teaching throughout his life. In the first great turning of the
wheel, he talked about all the different ways of dividing up your
"self". And we're gonna come back to that later tonight. All
the different ways to divide a human being. If you ever read the
(b: Abhidharmakosha) that's the first chapter, if you ever study
the (b: Heart Sutra) that's that's the main theme of the (b:
Heart Sutra). You go through all the parts of a person and
thereby learn more about the person. So, in the first turning of
the wheel Lord Buddha is mainly going through the different parts
of a person, or the different parts of the universe, and then
he...he sort of says that everything does have some sort of
existence by definition. When he gets to the second turning of
the wheel, he gets very radical and he says "nothing has any
nature of its own". And then the third turning of the wheel is
triggered by a confused Bodhisattva, named Dundam Yangdak Pak who
comes up to Lord Buddha and says "did you mean what you said in
the second turning of the wheel"? Which is also by implication
to ask "did you did you mean what you said in the first turning
of the wheel"? And and which are we to take literally and which
are we to take figuratively. And Lord Buddha splits the
question, okay, like any good philosopher. He he says "well,
sometimes I was and sometimes I wasn't". You know what I mean.
So in the second turning of the wheel when I said nothing had any
nature of it's own, with some things I was being literal and with
other things I wasn't being literal. And if you want to
understand it more easily, you can divide all the stuff in the
world into three groups, sometimes they're called the "three
attributes of the Mind Only School". And and you can understand
it that way. When I said "nothing had a nature, I meant three
different things. The first thing I meant was that nothing had a
nature of existing "by definition", meaning, from it's own side
through it's own unique way of being, and in that case I was
talking about imaginary things, okay, like a flower that you
imagine growing in mid-air. Like a two headed thirty foot purple
elephant rampaging through this room right now, like a giant
pumpkin squashing the Twin Towers, or like the idea of "Roy"
(laughs), okay, all right, those are all just ideas, those are
all just your imagination. They're...some of them refer to some
things that exist...he's sitting over there...some of the things
refer to things that don't exist. It's not squashing the Twin
Towers, okay? But in either case, they don't exist from their
own side through their own unique way of being 'cause they are
just things you make up in your mind. And that's the first thing
I meant when I said nothing had any nature. Second thing I meant
with that nothing had any nature of growing meaning those things
in the world which have causes don't grow by themselves. And the
most important example of the things in the world that have
causes and don't grow by themselves is what? How about your
death? (laughs) all right? And your aging, okay? That's the
main one, okay. The fact that you're getting older, the fact
that you're gonna die or may die if you don't practice well is
that the main the main point is to say that those aren't
causeless, they do have a cause, there's a reason why you're
getting old, there's a reason why you're gonna die if you die,
which I hope you don't die, and and and there's a reason why that
happens, and you can stop it. Okay, so that that was the second
thing I meant, was that nothing...none of the changing things
around you, the dependent things, has any nature of growing by
itself without its causes and conditions. Okay. That's the
second one. The third thing I meant when I said things didn't
have any nature was that certain things are not ultimate in
various way, and in that case I was referring to emptiness
itself, okay. Emptiness itself being...you can define it
positively as the thing that you see that purifies your mental
afflictions permanently eventually, after you see it, or you can
define it negatively as the fact that nothing in the world exists
by itself. Okay. You can define it either way, but either way,
that's what I meant in the third meaning, when I said nothing had
any nature, okay. Then the Buddha goes on to tell Dun Dundam
Yangdak Pak, that Bodhisattva, "I can give you now three special
words you can refer to these three things as. The first one is
what?

(students: (kun taks)

(Kun taks). Okay. Say (kun tak) (repeat) (kun tak) (repeat)
(Kun tak) means "imaginary stuff, imaginary things", okay.
Sometimes they refer to things that exist, like Roy. Sometimes
they refer to things that don't exist, like self-existant things,
okay, the (gak cha). Okay. What's the second one?

(students: (Shen wangs)

(Shen wang), meaning "dependent things; things that have causes".
Okay. And the third one?

(students: (Yong drup)

(Yong drup) being the Mind Only School's code word for?

(students: Emptiness)

Emptiness. Okay. Oh, not so bad. You remember more than I do
(laughs) okay. So those are those three. Now, the Buddha goes
through explaining that, and then he goes through explaining the
other four radical statements he made, nothing starts, nothing
stops, everything's peace, everything's nirvana, and he goes
through...he explains all those, but in each case he's using
those three categories. In each case he's he's answering through
those three categories. Okay. To the Bodhisattva. Now the
Bodhisattva asks a very natural question. Which is? What are
these three categories? Where'd you come up with that? Why did
you come up with that? Why didn't you say that in the first
place? Okay. Why in the second turning of the wheel, why did
you say "nothing exists, nothing has any nature of it's own". Why
didn't you...in the second turning of the wheel, why didn't you
bring up these three things, okay, and why you bringing them up
now? And what do the mean? Becaus...they're kinda weird
categories, they don't seem to connect much, you know, oh three
categories of all existing things: things you make up in your
mind, things that change and emptiness, I mean who would ever
come up with that, you see, how many people in this room would
come up with that on their own (laughter) you see what I mean.
(laughs) you know. Let's divide all three things...let's divide
all reality into those three things, so the Buddha...the
Bodhisattva's like "how did you come up with that and how're we
supposed to know you meant that", you know, what what...these
three things don't seem connected at all and they just seem to be
three things that you just wanted to talk about or something, but
you didn't mention this the second time you turned the
wheel...now you mentioning all this stuff, okay? How'd you come
up with these three and what do these three mean, okay, and why
did you come up with these three and is there some kind of
relationship between these three...is there some point to
dividing these things...all things into these three, is there
some kind of secret message here that you're not telling us, so
Lord Buddha, in the sutra...which is what sutra? The sutra that
the Mind Only School loves to quote to prove that they are right,
when they say the Buddha didn't mean what he said in the second
turning of the wheel and he did mean what he said in the third
turning of the wheel 'cause in the third turning of the wheel, he
said "some what I meant...some what I said in the second turning
of the wheel was right and some of what I said in the second
turning of the wheel you have to interpret". Okay. So so they
like they like that sutra. It's called (b: The Sutra of the True
Intent of the Sutras). Right. It's the (b: Commentary on the
True Intent of the Sutras). Commentary by whom? A later Indian
pandit? (laughter)

(students: Lord Buddha. No)

No, I mean all the commentaries are written by later Indian
pandits except this one. This one is written by Lord Buddha.
This is Lord Buddha explaining to the Bodhisattva what he meant
in all his other teachings, okay? So they love to quote this
sutra because this sutra seems to support the Mind Only School,
okay? So then they're gonna quote this sutra and and now here
comes the next question, you know, Dundam Yangdak Pak says
"Wh...what do you mean when you say (kun tak)? Okay. What do
you mean when you say an imaginary thing? Are there any like
typical qualities of imaginary things that we should know about?"
 And Buddha says "yeah, there are". And being a good Gelugpa,
(laughter) he says "three". Okay. (laughter). He makes, he
makes categories, okay. He divides it into three categories...in
the sutra. Here's the first one. By the way, you gotta do your
homework, okay, if you don't do you homework the whole thing is
useless. I taught for fifteen years in New York, nobody learned
anything, you know, I had to start all over again. Okay. You
gotta do your homework, okay? Please. I don't care if you missed
them already...start now, okay, you won't learn anything if you
don't do you homework, okay. It'll be some fuzzy thing in two
weeks. In three weeks it'll probably be Vaibashika (laughs)
(laughter), in four weeks it'll be some Hindu thing, you know
(laughs), okay, all right, really, okay, please. Just write
something. Thomas Olson gives everybody a hundred, I heard that.
(laughter) (laughs) Pilar's even easier. Okay. Say (nampar)
(repeat) (tokpay) (repeat) (chuyul) (repeat) (Nampar) (repeat)
(tokpay) (repeat) (chuyul) (repeat). Three qualities of (kun
taks). Okay. Three qualities of imaginary things...uh.h.h yeah,
we can say that. No, we can't say that. Scratch that. Three
qualities of dependent things. He starts out with dependent
things. I'm sorry. Okay? We we now have three qualities of
dependent things. Okay.

(student: (Shen wangs?)

(Shen wangs), yeah. Three qualities of (shen wangs). To make it
easy. To to say that more correctly, these are three qualities
of (shen wangs) that relate to (kun taks), you see what I mean?
But you'll see why. So (nampar tokpa, nampar tokpa) means "to
construct something in your mind, okay? (Nampar tokpa) means to
construct something in your mind. Like, when you look at this
pen, according to the Mind Only School, you're doing two kinds of
(nampar tokpas). One, you're creating a mental image, or you're
focusing on a mental image of of "pen", okay. It's very close to
the idea of (dun chi) in that we studied in Madyamika, in Middle
Way, but forget now Madyamika right now. Okay. So there is a
mental image you have of this pen that you are doing. You're
making some kind of mental picture of this pen...you are
constructing a pen in your mind and the thing you call pen, okay.
 Remember the boy named Tashi...we'll go back to him later, okay,
but you're constructing something...you you're...this was a black
and white stick until you called it pen and then you had a nice
thing called "pen" in your mind. Okay. And that's a (nambar
tokpa). (Nambar tokpa) means to to make a construct in your
mind...to build up a construct in your mind. The Mind Only
School says, by the way, that you never really see the pen, okay?
 You are constantly dealing with constructs. The pen itself is a
very subtle, very hard to get at, very very very subtle thing and
you almost never get beyond the curtain of your own images, your
own mental images, your own constructs, so (nampar tokpa) means
"construct". (Yul me...Chuyul) means "the arena in which the
constructing state of mind is doing its thing". Okay. The arena
in which the state...the constructing state of mind is doing its
thing, What is the arena here? It's the pen. Okay. And the
constructing state of mind is playing around with that object and
and making up a thing called "pen", okay? So there is very very
subtle thing there, out there, okay, in this school, there is a
very subtle object out there, and then your mind is playing
around in that arena and making some creation of a pen, and most
of the time when you think you're seeing the pen or concentrating
on the pen, you're actually dealing with your own mental image of
the pen. Your own construct of the pen, okay? So they they
believe there is a pen out there, some very subtle thing and that
you almost never get to it through the veil of your own labels
and names and constructs, okay? So the first quality of changing
things in the Mind Only School...you know, the Bodhisattva asked
Lord Buddha, "What do you mean when you say (shen wang)? What do
you mean when you say (kun tak)"? Lord Buddha says, you know,
"it's the thing that you're playing with when you make your
constructs. It is the arena in which you invent your
constructs", okay? That's the first quality of what? A changing
thing. Like a pen. Like a chair. Like you. Okay. That's the
first quality of that. It's the arena in which you play when you
make your constructs. Okay. This is mainly referring to the
state of mind that make constructs, right? Okay. The first
quality of all changing things is that they are the playground in
which your mind invents it's constructs, okay? Think of it like
that. It's like Yankee Stadium, it's the place in which you do
the baseball game. Okay. The pen is first of all that...a
changing thing is first of all that. It's the thing
you're...it's the arena in which you make your constructs...in
which you invent your constructs called "pen", okay? All right?
Does that construct exist, by the way? Does it refer to an
existing thing? Pen.

(students: Yes)

Yeah, it's an imaginary thing, it's an invention of your mind,
like like Phuntsok, or like Chudrun or like that, see those are
constructs in your mind, you're making them up in your mind.
There's nothing about those four particular limbs and that
particular round head which is any more Phuntsok than anybody
else. You are labeling it, okay. You are making it up. You are
inventing it. You are making a construct, okay, with your mind.
 Okay. Yeah?

(student: When you talk about the arena, are you talking about
external matter or the process of your mind?)

John says, "when I say arena am I referring to external matter or
the process of your mind". I'm referring to...you can say
external matter, you can say an external thing. Now in this
school, do you accept external things? That's a whole nother
story...we'll talk about it later, okay, but but I'm talking
mainly changing things out there, which you, which you call "pen"
and then you get hung up on the idea of pen and you never quite
reach the pen itself, okay? You are...that is the place in which
you are doing your thing with your imagination. How's that. You
are inventing "pen" out there, with you mind, okay. Yeah?

(student: You once told me, sense data)

Calling it...are you calling it sense data?

(student: No, you're not)

No no no, not in this school, okay. We don't, you know, in the
Middle Way School we might say, you are looking at certain sense
data, blackness and whiteness and cylindricalness and you are
labeling it or you're thinking of it a certain way. That's
Middle Way School. Close the door, okay. In this school, there
is a real pen out there, that exists from it's own side, through
it's own unique way of being, but you are...it's somehow veiled
all the time by your thoughts about it. By your constructs about
it, okay. And that's the first quality of all changing things.
Okay. Is that they are the arena in which you...they are the
place where you do your thing with your imagination. Okay.
That's the first quality. (Nampar tokpay chuyul) means that. The
arena in which you mak...invent your...create constructs, okay?
Yeah?

(student: So if a dog saw that as a stick, that would just be the
dog's construct, the way a human seeing it as a pen is a human's
construct, it wouldn't affect the, the substance in the pen
itself, according to Mind Only).

Yeah, Marcus...flirting with a Middle Way School thing, okay.
You poor guys have had all that Middle Way stuff. You know, what
does a dog see? Does it...if this has penness from it's own
side, if it has from it's own side some unique way of being as a
pen, then wouldn't a dog see it as a pen? And and and how does
it work in this school, right? I think in this school you'd have
to say that the dog is seeing it as a pen. Okay. Or that they
are, that they're having their own construct about it, but they
would say it has penness from it's own side, okay...in this
school. I think in this school you'd have to say that. Yeah?

(student: In this school (unclear) the concept of
functionality?)

Do they accept the idea of functionality?

(student: Of functionality as part of the thing by definition?)

Yeah, and in fact in this school...this is the highest...she said
does do they accept the function...funcken...functionality, and
and this school is one of the schools that says functionality is
inherent in the thing. Okay, this is the highest school that
says functionality is inherent in the thing itself, okay. That's
a that's a tri...that's a difficult question...long story. We
don't want to open that. Okay. Here's the second quality of a
(shen wang). Say (kuntakpay) (repeat) (tsennyi kyi) (repeat)
(ne) (repeat) (Kuntakpay) (repeat) (tennyi kyi) (repeat) (ne)
(repeat). Okay, before I go on I'm gonna go back to the boy
named Tashi. Okay. And I'll make it a little easier for you,
okay? So, remember we gave this example, Geshe Thubten Rinchen's
famous example of the boy named Tashi. There's a a Tibetan
father and and his pregnant wife and they...he's not a father
yet...anyway...a man and his pregnant wife and they are having
their first baby, and she gets bigger and bigger and bigger and
then finally one day she gives birth to this baby boy. And it's
just a lump of flesh, okay...it's a it's a four-arm...it's two
arms, two legs, four limbs, a head, a torso and it makes noise
and it cries. And this is a baby boy, okay. And it's just a
baby boy. The day that the thing is born, the day that the thing
comes out, it's just a baby boy, okay. A day later or two days
later, Mommy and Daddy talk it over and they decide to call the
boy?

(students: Tashi)

Tashi. Okay, like Tashi de lek, okay, and and it means "goodness
or good luck" or something like that...auspiciousness. And then
they they label the boy "Tashi" and they start thinking about him
as Tashi, okay, and then there comes about this construct, this
imaginary thing called "Tashi the boy." The boy named Tashi,
okay. Is there a baby boy there? Yes. From it's own side?
Yes. Does the concept, Tashi, exist from it's own side in the
way the boy does? No. Prove it. Because the moment he pops
out, not everybody goes "hey, Tashi's here", (laughs) okay? All
right. That proves that's a construct. That proves it does not
have it's own unique way of being from it's own side, which is
the definition of? Existing by definition in this school. Okay.
 If Tashi the boy existed by definition, if the boy named Tashi
existed by definition, then he would exist from his own side,
then the minute he popped out of his mom's womb, everybody'd say
"oh, Tashi's here". Okay. But it...they didn't say "Tashi's
here", because that's a construct. That's an imaginary thing. A
day later, they start to think of him as Tashi the boy. And the
thing called Tashi the boy is in everybody's mind. All there is
out there is a baby. Okay. Tashi the boy is a construct that
goes on existing through his whole life, and people forget that
it was a construct, but it is a construct. And the fact that not
everybody said "Oh here's Tashi the boy" the minute he popped out
is proof that it's a construct in this school. Because
constructs are the only one of those three attributes that don't
exist from their own side. Okay. They don't, they don't exist
from their own side. The only one...is construct, okay. So,
Tashi the boy. What corresponds here to the constructing state
of mind? The labeling state of mind? What's the example in
this...what's this part of this example that represents the
constructing state of mind? The mind that makes up all this
stuff?

(student: The arena?)

It's Mom and Dad. Okay. It's Mom and Dad because they give the
label, they give the name, okay? So think of Mom and Dad as the
state of mind which makes up (kun taks). Okay, the (kun tak)ing
state of mind, okay. Think of Mom and Dad as the (kun tak)ing
state of mind. Think of the boy named Tashi as the (shen wang).
It's that pen, out there, okay. And then the (kun tak) is what?
The boy named Tashi. Which is only existing in people's minds,
okay, it's a construct, okay? Got it? So if you get it straight
with that example then you'll be okay later. You gotta do
through it again, okay, constructive state of mind, the mind
that's inventing the (kun taks), the mind that's putting (kun
taks) on all those (shen wangs), is Daddy and Mom...Mom and Dad.
Okay. And then out here is the boy that was born, that lump of
flesh, okay and in between them, standing somehow between them,
are the (kun taks), meaning, later you begin to mistake them for
the boy, the boy named Tashi. He's just an idea. If that thing
had been between you and the baby the first day, everyone would
have said, "oh here's Tashi came out". But it wasn't there. It
came later. It came a day or two later, okay? So there's a
state of mind that gives the thing the name, or the label, then
there's the thing that gets the name which is the (shen wang),
and then there's the thing that's constructed which is the (kun
tak) lying between the baby and mom and dad. It's just an idea
lying between those two, got it? Okay. So there's a (kun tak),
here's a (shen wang) and here's a state of mind called Mom and
Dad which is giving the...which is inventing the (kun tak) okay?
Got it? Hum. Not too many nods there. All right. (laughter)
(laughs). So when you say...how do we describe the baby? You
see, the baby represents what?

(students: (shen wangs))

(Shen wangs). Changing things. How do we describe the baby?
Well first of all, he's the thing that they put their trip on
(laughter), okay? He's the poor thing, he's like a dart
board...he's the dart board upon which they shoot they darts,
okay? That's his first quality. Okay? This is emphasizing, by
the way...number one is emphasizing that he's the thing that
their minds are laying the trips on. So it's almost emphasizing
more their state of mind. If you think about (nampar tokpay
chuyul), the arena in which all these things, these labels are
being put, you have to think of Mom and Dad, okay. It it
emphasizes more Mom and Dad laying this trip on that poor baby,
okay. Yeah.

(student: So in this the baby or the Mom and Dad?)

These are three qualities of the baby.

(student: The first...the first one)

Yeah, all three

(student: Mom and Dad (unclear) or is it the baby?)

It's the baby, now get it, okay...this is the tough part, tonight
you are going to discover that the three attributes of the Mind
Only School stand like a tripod, and they support each other.
That's the whole point of what we're doing tonight, okay? The
Bodhisattva asked what? Where'd you come up with these three
things. They don't have any connection at all. And then by the
time you get done with this class, tonight, and by the time Lord
Buddha gets done with his answer to the Bodhisattva, you find out
that each one is needed for each of the others. They stand like
a tripod. They support each other, okay? So when the
Bodhisattva asked, "what's a (shen wang)? Buddha...first thing
Buddha says is "oh it's that thing that you aim your your (kun
taks) towards." He's defining changing things by describing how
imaginary things relate to them. And that's how he's going to do
the whole answer. And he's going to prove to the Bodhisattva
that he's not just random three groups he came up...they define
each other in a very very beautiful way, okay. And that's the
why he brought up these three things. Okay. The imaginary
things, the changing things and the emptiness. All tied together
in this beautiful beautiful way, okay? That's going to be the
point of the thing tonight, okay. So. Lord Buddha says, "oh
first thing you want to know about (shen wangs)? They're
the...they're what the constructs are aimed at. When you shoot a
construct, that's what they're aimed at." Okay, like a dart,
okay? Now, number two. Say (kuntakpay) repeat) (tsennyi kyi)
(repeat) (ne) (repeat). (Kuntakpay) means...(kuntakpay) means
"(kun taks)", okay, imaginary things. (tsennyi) means, in this
case "that attribute of the Mind Only School". The group called
(kun taks). Okay. (Kuntakpay tsennyi) means "the group called
(kun taks). (Ne) means "the place where they get parked". (Ne)
means "place". Okay. The place where you park your (kun taks).
The place where (kun taks) stay. This is talking what? After
the dart has been thrown and the dart has already stuck
there...what's the dart? Let's call it "the name, Tashi". What's
the dart board? The poor kid that got the name Tashi. Okay
(laughter) (laughs) all right? Okay? So now you're talking about
it from the dartboard side than from the dart side, okay? The
first one was more from the dart side. Okay. What is the...how
do you describe (shen wangs)? How do you describe changing
things? Oh those are the things we throw our ideas at, that we
build out constructs around.

(student: Do they then become independent, the the darts that
then become (unclear)

Yeah, people...she said, "does the dart become independent?" My
god, yes, that's the whole point of this whole lecture tonight.
That's the whole point of talking about three different things.
You start to think of it as independent. You start to think of
Tashi as having some independent existence. He must have been
Tashi forever. And I don't like him either. And he's unlikable
too (laughter) (laughs) okay? From his own side, it's not my
construct, okay? And that's how all your suffering starts.
That's gonna be the punch line, okay, you're about a hal...forty
five minutes ahead. (laughter) Yeah.

(student: (Kun tak) doesn't change, right?)

Yeah. (kun taks) don't change. (Kun taks) are concepts. (Kun
taks) are concepts...like the sky is blue. Or sky. You see, in
this school and in and in the logic schools, "sky", the idea
"sky". It doesn't get more or less sky. It's always "sky" okay?
 Like that. Okay. So now we're talking about (kuntakpay tsennyi
kyi ne) means "the place where you put your (kun taks)", okay?
We're still talking about the pen. Okay. In number one we're
talking about it as the object that we lay our (kun taks) on and
now we're talking about it as the place where the (kun taks) come
to rest and park. Okay. But we're still talking about (shen
wangs) okay? All right. This is how Lord Buddha is describing
changing things. They are the things that you make up stuff
about in your mind, like ah, he's a bad person from his own side,
and they're also the place that ends up getting labeled. Okay.
And they're very close, okay. Number one and number two are the
same thing, just from different angle.

One is the thing you throw the darts at, the other thing is the
thing that gets hit by the darts. The darts are your
imagination. The darts are your names and labels. He's a bad
person, I don't like him, he's bad from his own side, okay? So
from one point of view, the guy throwing the dart. From one
point of view, the guy that gets hit by the dart. Okay. They're
both referring to the baby. What's the dart?

(students: Tashi)

Tashi. What's the hand?

(students: Mom and Dad)
Mom and Dad, naming him, labeling him, giving him a a label.
Okay. And at some point everybody forgets that they made it up,
and he's "Tashi" from his own side, and that's ignorance that's
holding that, okay. Is that a (kun tak), Tashi who exists from
his own side? Tashi who was Tashi from the beginning, Tashi who
must be Tashi, does that exist, does that exist?

(student: No)

No. Is it a (kun tak)? Yeah. Okay? And that's the (kun tak)
that gives you all your trouble. In this school, if you could
realize that you wouldn't have ignorance anymore and the wheel of
life would ground to a halt because one o'clock got stopped.
What is one o'clock?

(students: Ignorance)

Ignorance, okay. It's not realizing that you're making up Tashi
and you're making up "bad guy" and you, you're making them up,
and then they become natural to you, they become as if they
always existed like that, okay? And that's how you get your
troubles. So it's very beautiful, you see. We're getting (gak
cha) here. We're getting the thing that emptiness is empty of
but it's a little bit early, okay? Number three. Say (du je
kyi) (repeat) (tsen ma) (repeat) (du je kyi) (repeat) (tsen ma )
(repeat) (Du je) means "factor", okay. In Sanscrit it's
samscara. People say "compositional whatchamajiggies, I don't
know. Anyway, it just means "anything that causes another
thing." (Du je) means "anything that causes another thing. A
factor. Okay. Anything that bring about something else is
called (du je). (Du je kyi tsenma) means "the characteristics of
a factor", okay? (Du je kyi tsenma) means "the characteristics
of a of a factor". This is another quality of changing things.
What? They exhibit the quality of making other things happen.
Okay. That's the third quality of a changing thing. They
exhibit the quality of making other things happen, okay, and of
being caused themself. Okay, that's the implication of that. So
Lord Buddha is explaining what it means to be a changing thing.
What does he say? He...wouldn't it be easy if he just said, "oh
hey, Dundam Yangdak Pak, oh Bodhisattva, you wanna know what I
mean when I say "changing thing"? Ah, it's anything that has a
cause. Anything that has a factor". Why didn't he just say
that? What did...what did he answer? Oh, it's those things you
think about as a pen. And it's those things that get thought
about as pens. And it's those things that do something like a
pen. Okay. I wish he'd given an easier answer, right, okay?
Those are the three characteristics we've just finished. Okay,
I'll say it again. Good old Bodhisattva Dundam Yangdak Pak comes
up and says, "can you tell me what you mean by changing thing?"
He says, "I mean three things when I say changing thing. It's
the thing that you're imaging as a changing thing. It's the
thing that gets imagined as a changing thing. And it's the thing
that changes, okay. (laughter) Now why didn't he just go...why
did he go through the first two, okay. Why did he go through
that? What's the point, okay? I'll say it again, one more time.
 Okay. The Bodhisattva comes up to Buddha and says, "Second
turning of the wheel you said nothing had any nature of it's own,
right?" He says, "yeah. That's what I said." "Did you mean it
when you said that?" He says, "no". "Well, what were you
talking about?" "Oh, three different things, three different
natures they don't have, that's all I meant. I didn't mean it
literally. I mean, of course things have natures, you know".
And then he, and then the Bodhisattva says, "well, how do you
get these three natures? What're you talking about, three
different groups or three different attributes of things?" He
says, "Oh, what's the first one you want to ask about?" He says,
"Tell me about (shen wangs). What do you mean when you say
dependent things are changing things?" It would be so easy if
Lord Buddha would just say what? Things that change. Things
that have causes. Things that cause other things. That's a
changing thing. But he doesn't answer that way. How does he
answer? The things you imagine as changing things. The things
that get imagined by you as a changing thing. And the things
that change. Okay? (laughter). Now why why does he go through
those first two, okay? I mean, that's the big question tonight,
right. Why didn't...why does us confuse us and the Bodhisattva,
you know, why is he going into all that. He wants you to think
about how these things are constructs. Okay. He's trying to
force you to think about how changing things are constructs of
your own mind. Okay. He could have said, "oh changing things is
things that change", but he didn't. He said "changing things are
things you think about as changing things, the things that get
thought about as changing things, and the things that change,
okay? Why did he do that? He's trying to get you into
understanding that a lot of this you make up in your own mind,
okay? He's trying to get you to understand that the boy named
Tashi wasn't Tashi from the beginning and the pen wasn't a pen
from the beginning. Okay. You are creating a thing called pen.
You have an idea called "pen" that's standing like a curtain
between you and the pen. And you get mixed up looking at the
your idea of the pen and mistake it for the "pen". There is a
pen out there. There is a boy out there. And there is a Tashi.
But Tashi is an idea between you and the boy. And pen is an idea
between you and the pen. And you're never really seeing the pen
and you're never really seeing Tashi. All you're seeing is a ba
a baby, that you're thinking of as Tashi, okay? And you've gotta
get used to that. There ain't no Tashi from his own side. There
ain't no Tashi that exists by definition. What's that got to do
with my enlightenment? What do I ha...what's that go to do with
me not dying, okay? That's a big question you should always ask,
I mean you hear some Buddhist lecture somewhere, you gotta ask
the guy, or the girl, okay, "what's that got to do with me not
dying? Okay, why do I have to know that? Who cares?" Okay.
It's very important, because what? You will think about other
people as if they existed by definition. And that they're not
constructs of your own mind. So what's the problem with that?
An apple'll taste the same whether I'm constructing it or not,
right? It is a problem there. Because you'll begin to think,
you'll begin to think that it's good or bad from it's own side,
by definition, and not something that your mind is creating,
okay. You gotta get used to that. That's why Lord Buddha, when
when the Bodhisattva asked him what's a changing thing mean, he
says, things you think about as changing things, and things that
get thought about by you as a changing thing, okay, you have to
you have to appreciate that. Now, yeah?

(student: When you're born and before you know things about
things, before you know how to name things, then how do you see
things?)
She said, "When you're born and before you know things about
things, before you know how to name things, then how do you see
things and how do you know about them". Say (da jang gyi kye bu)
(repeat) say (da jang) (repeat) (gyi kye bu) (repeat) (da jang
gyi) (repeat) (kye bu) (repeat) Very very very unique expression
in this school and and in the logic schools. (Da) means "the word
for something". It's an ancient word for "word", okay? (Da)
means "the word for something. Okay. Like pen. (Da) means,
(da)...pen is one kind of (da) or or expression or word. (Jang)
means "the person who knows it". (Da jang gyi kye bu) means "the
person who knows the name for the thing. Okay. (Da jang gyi kye
bu) means "the person who knows the name for a thing". So when
you're first born, and when you first come out of your mom's
womb, then technically, you don't know the names for things yet
and you're not a (da jang gyi kye bu). Okay. So what, really
what Genevieve is asking is, before you're a (da jang gyi kye
bu), how do you think of things, how do you know things, how do
you perceptualize things? Remember that we said that
perceptualization takes place in two ways. What were they?
Labeling takes place in two ways. One is to name it that thing
and one is to think of it as that thing, okay. So the thinking
is there already. Okay. That's from your past life. You're
already conceptualizing it as a discreet object, from your past
life. You don't know the name for it yet. Don't forget that
(kun tak)ing, okay, making (kun taks) comes in two flavors. One
is giving it it's proper name (da jang gyi kyebu), and only (da
jang gyi kyebu's) can do that, okay, so by the time you're five
you're a (da jang gyi kyebu). I don't know...ask, Kirin's not a
(da jang gyi kyebu), right? Everything is "da". (laughter)
(laughs). Even mommy's "da". Okay. He's not a (da jang gyi
kyebu) yet. But later on you become a (da jang gyi kyebu). But
even before that you were perceptualizing things in a certain
way. You know, you didn't maybe perceive it as per perfectly as
a pen, but you have a strong predelection for perceiving it as a
pen and that's what makes you perceive it as a pen so quickly.
It's not that you're like smarter than animals, okay? It's not
like you're really smart and you get it and they never get it.
You got millions of years of thinking about it as a pen.
Millions of years. You're just coming back to what you always
knew, okay? And an animal, having collected really lousy karma,
doesn't have that memory so recently and it can't recognize
it...it does not cognize it as that and it goes on thinking that
it's something to chew for ever. We had this question of Geshe
Thubten Rinchen. Is anything in the world new? He said "no".
Every...the reason you...the reason Mozart played piano at a
certain age is that he was just remembering something, you know,
that he knew for millions of years, you know. The reason that
you see all the things around you and the way that you see it, is
that you've been in this show a thousand million times, and
that's why...and some people pick it up faster and some people
pick it up slower, but you have all the seeds in your mind to see
the world the way you see it, and now to change it, and to move
up to another level, especially a tantric level is a big job and
very difficult. But it's much easier if you understand how
you're making up the names for everything. That's the clue.
That's the perfection of wisdon. You see? If somebody says, do
you realize that you're creating all this stuff yourself? Then
you're eligible to reach tantra. You see. You gotta go through
the Mind Only School stuff, or least the Middle Way stuff, before
you can really un...move up to a different level. Right now you
are restricted to everything you remember from your past lives.
And you are perceiving your world, you are inventing your world
on the basis of seeds that have been there for thousands and
thousands of years. You're not like smarter than animals, okay?
You just saw this as a pen for so many thousands of times before
that you recognize it again as a pen in this life, pretty quick,
you know, by the time you were five, okay. And animals are like
a little bit behind you 'cause they haven't thought of them that
way for a few million lives, okay? Now to...now in this life to
move up through the things you knew, into new things and to see
the world in a new way, has to happen through the door of (b: The
Perfection of Wisdom), which is to understand how you are
inventing pen. You know, you have to know (kun tak), you have to
know (shen wang) and you have to know (yong drup) before you can
see this world in a new way and not die, okay? You have to go
through this exercise. It's very cool. It's...that's knowledge.
 That's the (b: Perfection of Wisdom), making that leap from what
you knew in your past lives, and then what you are capable of
being, which is a tantric deity, requires the perfection of
wisdom. You have to know what you're doing with the objects
around you before you can make that leap, and that's why you come
to these classes, okay, and that's why the Buddha taught those
three things, (kun taks, shen wangs and yong drups). Yeah?

(student: So I just want to get this straight)

Yeah.

(student: Now, by the time, like we would get to idea of like
"Tashi", where you begin to (unclear, Tashi thought), Tashi is
already full of thoughts, right?

Yeah. (laughter)

(student: starting with)

No, there is no Tashi yet, sorry.

(student: right)

You caught me.

(student: Starting with like, starting with like the entire
tendency to discreetly objectify,

Yeah.

(student: And then building everything on top of that, Tashi is
already like built like darts everywhere, and then the Tashi
dart)

Yeah?

(student: So it's not like the Tashi that prevents you just from
seeing Tashi, it's that Tashi dart and all the other darts that
go along with that, so when you were throwing it at Tashi, Tashi,
the real Tashi, or not even the real Tashi but, that ineffable
"Tashiness" or something, is like totally (unclear).

He's saying, like, isn't Tashi full of darts even before you
through the Tashi dart? Well, first of all, you can't say
Tashi's full of darts 'cause you're not Tashi yet. Okay. He's
just a boy, right, until you throw the Tashi dart. But, didn't
you throw a lot of boy darts just to think of him as a boy? You
know, in this school you say?

(student: No)

No. The boy is a (shen wang). Boy exists from its' own side.
Boy has its own identity. Boy would be boy in all situations.
Boy is emanating "boyness" from its own side. Boy has its own
boyness. Oh yeah, in this school. (Shen wangs) are (rang gi
tsen nyi kyi druppa), they exist by definition. What does that
mean? They exist from their own side, in this school, you gotta
go down...you know, you're used to high school. Go back to third
grade. Go back to the Mind Only School way of thinking of
things. There is a pen out there. It does have its own
existence from its own side. It does have penness from its own
side. Okay. You gotta used....the boy exists from his own side.
 The "Tashi" doesn't. There's a big different in this school.
Why? Boy is a?

(students: (shen wang))

(Shen wang). Tashi is a?

(students: (kun tak))

(Kun tak). (Kun taks) don't come from their own side. They get
made up in your head. (Shen wangs) exist "out there", from their
own side, they have their own real existence. The boy is not
full of darts. The boy has his own discreet, unique identity
from his own side, and its not something I made up in my mind.
Tashi's now...Tashi's different. Tashi's something I made
up...you guys are spoiled by Madyamika. You got Middle Way
spoiled, okay? (laughter). You thinking of everything as as as
being (kun), as being labeled, right? Forget it. In this school
(shen wangs) are different, right? Why? They are (rang gi tsen
nyi kyi druppa). They exist by definition from their own side.
Then later you think of them as good pen, bad pen, whatever you
want, okay. Or you name it Tashi, or you name it...what...vis a
vis, fine point overhead projected pen, you know, okay. But
there is a pen out there. It does exist out there. I may be
interpreting it a certain way, I may be calling it a certain
thing, but there does exist a pen out there. Don't you really
think that in your own heart about everything around you? You
are Mind Only School. Forget it. Okay. You believe that. And
it gives you (laughs) all your suffering. Okay. You know, you're
not studying Mind Only School as some philosophical bullshit, you
know, you're studying Mind Only School 'cause you really believe
it, and we're trying to overcome your belief in that, okay.
There is not a pen out there on its own that you think of as a
good pen or a bad pen. Right. When I always give the example in
a class about the boss that comes in and I see him as...he yells
at me for being a bad employee, and I get hurt, and the guy next
to me is happy because I'm getting in trouble, he doesn't like
me, and so I'm interpreting the boss as bad and he's interpreting
the boss as good, and then there was this lady in Australia who
heard this whole lecture, and the next morning she demanded an
interview, and she came...this is Nick Ribush's mother, okay?
(laughter) (laughs) And she says, she says...she travels all the
way to this center in in...where is it?

(student: Melbourne)

Melbourne...to ask me this one question, you know. Doesn't the
boss also...isn't the boss also a creation? Isn't the boss also
an interpretation? I said, "you know, like one person out of a
thousand gets it and she gets it, right away. Right away she's
asking me this question. I said "you're right". But but
in...but we have to talk Mind Only when you talk to a large group
of people in Melbourne, Australia, you can't say, "yeah, and by
the way, the boss also doesn't exist". Okay. You can't say
that. People freak out. You just have to say, "well, you know,
your idea of the boss is good, or your idea of the boss is bad,
it's your karma...your karmic projection". But to go and say
that the boss himself is your karmic projection, that's too much.
 But she got it right away, it was really cool. She would,
right? If you know Nick. (laughter) Okay.
(student: One of the (unclear) of thinking of the construct of
Tushi, Tashi is self existence)

Yeah, in this school, one flavor, the main flavor of
ignorance...there's a couple flavors of ignorance like, thirty
one flavors, right, but in this school the main one is to think
that Tashi gets the name Tashi by definition, okay. That Tashi
is the thing we call Tashi naturally, by definition. He couldn't
have been John Doe. Must have been Tashi from his own side.
Okay. Meaning, the things you like and the things you don't like
must come from their own side that way, okay. And it's not your
fault. And you should be angry at them. Or you should chase
them even at the expense of other people, okay. That's that's
the whole way it starts. Okay. Those are the three qualities of
 of changing things. I'm gonna state the next homework
question...yeah, I'll state the next two, and then I'll give you
a break okay? This question says...okay, got this? In
explanations of the process of making constructs that follow from
the sutra references we just mentioned, which is those three
things, okay? When we talk about those three things a
distinction is made between the dependent thing that is the
object of the constructing state of mind, the constructing state
of mind itself, and the construct that quote "lies" between them,
okay. Explain these three as they occur in the example of the by
named Tashi. Okay. So what is the dependent thing that is the
object of the construct?

(students: The blob)

The blob, the baby boy. Okay. The unnamed baby boy that came
out of the mother's womb. Okay. That's that's the (shen wang)
in this case. Okay. It's the thing that's going to receive the
construct. Okay. It's the thing that's gonna be thought about
in a certain way. (Shen wang) okay. What's the constructing
state of mind itself in that example?

(students: Mom and Dad)

Mom and Dad who are giving him a name, Tashi, a day later. Okay.
That proves it's made up, okay? And what is the construct that,
quote "lies between them"?

(students: Tashi)

Th...Tashi, okay. Tashi. Great. Okay. That's the whole idea
in this school. Get used to it. There is a thing out there,
pen, my do think of it in a certain way, and then at some point I
get confused between my own construct and the real pen out there.
 Something like that. Okay. Next question. In the illustration
of the boy named Tashi, what is the indication that, according to
the Mind Only School, the construct does not exist by definition.
 What what...in this example of the boy named Tashi, what is the
evidence

(student: It wasn't Tashi when he first came out)

That Tashi is a construct. And doesn't exist by definition.
What's the evidence of that?

(students: (unclear))

Yeah, that at the moment he popped out, everybody didn't say "oh
Tashi's here, finally", you know. Okay? It came later. That's a
sign that it doesn't exist by definition, 'cause in this school,
existing by definition means what? Suggested from it's own side.
 It has its own real existance out there, "penness" from its own
side. Okay. If the thing had Tashiness from his own side, the
minute he popped out, everybody would have said "Tashi's here".
Okay. That's evidence that the idea Tashi, the (kun tak) called
Tashi does not exist by definition in this school, it does not
exist from its own side in this school. Okay. How many things
in this school, exist by definition? How many how many of those
three groups exist by definition?

(students: two)

Two of them. What?

(students: (shen wangs) and (yong drups))
The (shen wangs) and the (yong drups). The emptinesses and the
changing things exist by definition. Why? 'Cause they exist
from their own side, you don't have to make them up. But the
(kun taks)? They don't exist by definition 'cause you just make
them up. Okay. In this school that's a difference. Okay. In
the Madyamika School how many things exist by definition?

(students: none)

None. Okay. And do you have to split things into three to
explain it?

(students: no) (laughter)

No (laughs) okay. No. You don't have to reinterpret the second
turning of the wheel. That's where the Buddha told the real
thing, okay? Why did he go on and teach number three? Why'd he
teach wheel number three? 'Cause some people were freaking out
and he said, okay, they're gonna, you know, go become Jehova's
Witnesses (laughter) or something, you know (laughter) so so he
said, I better I better make up something and quick. I just
meant that, you know, I was just talking about three different
things, you know, and wha...I didn't meant to say everything
didn't you know didn't exist ...okay. He's just trying to keep
them in the fold. You know, he's trying to say, look, don't
worry, don't get nervous. I didn't really mean it when I said
nothing existed, or nothing had any nature of its own, okay? He
interpreted it for them, okay? All right? Okay. So take
a...yeah?

(student: (unclear))

You mean, if some people in this room saw a certain person in a
special way, would that be a (kun tak)?

(student: Things that change (unclear))

In this school, this is...she asked an interesting question.
Okay. Suppose that some people in this room collect some very
extraordinary karma and begin to see somebody else in this room
as a holy being, as a tantric deity. Okay. And then other
people in this room don't have that kind of karma and they don't
see them that way, they look like a normal person. Who's right?

(student: both)

Both. Okay. You got it...In in Madyamika, they're both right,
okay? In Mind Only, that's impossible. Somebody has to be right
and somebody has to be wrong, because angels are? Tantric deitys
are?

(students: (shen wangs))

(Shen wangs). They are changing things. They are people, okay.
You either is from your own side or you is not from your own
side. (laughter) Okay. So one of those people is having a
problem. And don't you think that way? You see, and don't you
yourself think that way? You know, on days when you can't see
people that way (laughs) (laughter) you know, don't you yourself
believe that. Buddha is trying to point out that you are Mind
Only, you know, you giggle at the Mind Only School but you is
Mind Only. You know what I mean. And you believe that. You
believe that this person is bad from their own side. You believe
that this one person in your life could never be a tantric angel.
 Impossible. They're just too irritating (laughter) you know.
It can't be from my side. It can't be, it can't be a perceptual
thing. They have to be irritating from their own side. Maybe
all those other people, possible. But this one person, no,
impossible, you know, and don't you believe that? Aren't you
Mind Only School with regard to certain people who irritate you?
Okay. That's the whole point of this class, okay. All right,
take a break and then we'll do more, okay.

(cut)

And we, what do you call it? We blackmailed him into give us
protection cords, (laughter) okay, so, what do you call it? Like
we traded, okay. We requested deep felt heart-feltly, and Elly
took care of that, so you have to thank Elly. Elly will be
passing them out after after the class, okay. So when you pick
up your homework, these were blessed by His Holiness for members
of our class, okay.

(student: (unclear))

Distracting. Distracting. Okay. (laughter). That's one. This
class is a very tiny abbreviation of a very heavy class taught by
Geshe Thubten Rinchen in Sera last month, for the practically the
whole month, and you're welcome to get the the audio tape if you
want. It's in English. He he cha he speaks in Tibetan for like
five minutes and then it's translate into English immediately.
There's also a video of it, which we won't do unless there's
enough people who want it. In other words, it costs like a a lot
of money to do the first copy and then each other copy doesn't
cost so much. So if you're interested in, I mean, the audio is
pretty good I think, but if for some reason you really want the
video, talk to talk to Ora. She's over there, okay. So it's a
kind of thing if we don't get ten orders or something like that
we won't do it 'cause it's it's really expensive. 'Cause its
sixty hours of digital video tape, but it's...I...per personally
I think it the most important teaching on the Mind Only School
that I'm aware of that's ever been given in English. So, from, I
mean, he's just an extraordinary teacher. So, you know, if
you're interested in that, talk about that. Last thing, we had a
really good trip to Arizona the last five days. There's a
rancher out there who has a very beautiful property near in the
high desert, cool desert, in southern Arizona. It looks very
much like Sera Monastery's location in Tibet. And it looks
pretty good. We had Winston was out there working very hard and
some other people, and we had many many meetings, many hours of
meetings with these these ranchers basically, who by coincidence
have been to Sera in Tibet, okay. That's a weird story
(laughter) and (laughs) so it looks really interesting, so I'll
keep you up to date on that, and that will be a three-year
retreat site. in starting in 2000 for a group of people and then they'll
prob...the rancher was even taking us around and showing us neat
valleys where we could have teachings for three weeks at a time.
So we'll probably twice a year during that three years we'll have
three week intensive teachings in like this huge tent out in the
meadows under the mountains. It's very beautiful. So. Keep you
up to date on that. Not not not decided totally yet. Okay. So
why does Lord Buddha...is it just random that he just picks these
three attributes, you know, (kun taks, shen wangs, yong drup).
Is it just random? Is he just, you know, we've talked about
already today that...who would think that up. I mean you're
sitting at your work place, you know, it's about time to eat
lunch, and then suddenly it occurs to you. "You know, you can
divide everything into (kun taks, shen wangs, and yong drups)"?
(laughter) You know what I mean? (laughs) I mean, it's not
something that would normally occur to you, you know. And then,
it's not like you spend all day thinking about, "oh, the pen is
like a dart board that I put my ascriptions on or my con
constructs on and it's like something that receives my
constructs, and by the way it's also a changing thing,"...you
don't go around thinking like that. Okay. So why did Lord
Buddha talk about that? Why did Lord Buddha make up these three
categories of stuff? What's the point of talking about things in
this way (kun taks, shen wangs, yong drups)...what's the point?
What's he trying to teach us? And this is where you get into the
interdependence of the three, okay. They are like a tripod.
Each one is defined by the other one and it's a very very
beautiful thing. If you get what I'm about to say, then you'll
understand the Mind Only School very well. You'll have a big big
insight into the Mind Only School. And the point is that each
one of those three helps the other two to exist, and they are
like three corners of a triangle, you see what I mean? Think of
it that way. Okay. And we'll go into it now. Why did Lord
Buddha start talking about, you know, if somebody came up to Elly
Vander Pas, you know, Jigme Pelmo said, "why do you talk about
(shen wangs), why do you talk about dependent things?" and her
answer is out of left-field...what do you call it...oh because
they're the object that you imagine about. So why are you
talking like that? Why don't you just say that they're things
that change, they're things that have causes, they're things
that, you know, why do you describe things as "oh, those are the
things that you lay your constructs on", you know. Why does Lord
Buddha talk like that? When he's describing plain old changing
stuff around us. He's trying to get you to think about (kun
taks). Okay. So think of it as a triangle. And you're gonna
get really good at it. We're gonna talk about it. We're gonna
talk about it, okay. I think, it..you know, do (kun taks) apply
to (shen wangs)? Do (shen wangs) apply to (yong drups) apply to
(shen wangs)? Do (yong drups) apply to (kun taks)? Do (kun
taks) relate to (shen wangs)? The whole point is yeah, they
define each other, okay? The crux is here. The crux is here.
(Shen wangs), okay, the things around you, ninety-nine point nine
nine nine percent of your experience is the changing things
around you, okay? We start from there. These are the basis.
This is why Lord Buddha, in responding about the three attributes
to the Bodhisattva brings up what? (Shen wangs). Everything is
from the point of view of (shen wangs). (Shen wangs) is what
gets called "things". Okay. (Shen wang) is the thing that
receives the names of things. (Shen wangs) is the changing
things. You wanna know what those three are? Why does he go
straight for (shen wangs)? Why doesn't he talk a little bit
about (kun taks)? Why doesn't he talk a little bit about (yong
drups)? (Shen wangs) are the basis of everything. Okay. Think
of (shen wangs) as the the basis of the whole conversation.
(Shen wangs), the things around you, okay, which are primarily
(kun jung den pa) and (dun yang den pa) meaning what? Suffering
and the truth of...the source of suffering. Okay. Ninety nine
point nine nine nine percent of the things around you are
changing. And exactly that many are suffering, okay? They are
either mental affliction or caused by mental affliction, or about
to give you new mental afflictions (laughter) okay? (laughs) All
right? Everything around you is totally tied up with suffering
and mental afflictions. Let's talk about those first, okay.
They are the basis. Think of them as the basis. The whole Mind
Only School is based or founded upon (shen wangs), changing
things. Okay. What can you say about those changing things? Oh,
I I think about them in certain ways. I (kun tak)ize them
(laughter). Okay. I think about them in certain ways. What are
the two ways I think about them? Well there's two flavors of
(kun taks). Here's one. Say (ngowo la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kuntak) (repeat) (Ngowo la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kuntak) (repeat). Two ways that you (kun tak)ize
things. Okay.

(cut)
two ways that you imagine things, two ways that you construct
about things, two things, two ways that you create your mental
images about things, and the first one is called (ngowo la
kuntakpay kuntak). (Ngowo) means "the essence of an object",
okay, (ngowo) means "the essence of an object". (Ngowo la
kuntakpay kuntak) means "a (kuntak) which is (kuntak)ed about the
essence of a thing". Meaning what? A construct that you
construct about the essence of a thing. The construct that you
construct about the essence of a thing. What's an example? Pen.
 That's all. Okay. Pen. Okay. What's the famous one from
Abendigo, Australia? Car. (laughs) Okay. Car. We had these
guys go around saying "car" for ten days (laughter). They're
sitting in front of the campfire out in Abendigo, Australia,
"car, car" (laughs) you know, okay, "car". The car is a concept
about the essence of that thing. Okay. Pen. Pen. The
construct pen. Call it a verbalization if you are a (da jang gyi
kyebu), if you know the words for things. Call it a a mental
construct if you don't, or or maybe you do both, okay. You think
of it as a pen. That's a construct. Okay. Thinking of it as a
pen is a construct, okay. That's about the essence of the pen.
Now you know what's coming next. What? What would be the second
kind of (kun tak)? If the if the basic one is to think pen, what
would be the second one?

(students: name)

Huh?

(students: Name)

But...no, the first one, they're both labels. The first one is
labeling it about its basic nature. And then what would the
second one be?

(student: It's qualities)

Yeah, it's various qualities. Blue. Long. Sharp. Okay. What.
Here's the second one. Say (kyepar la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kun tak) (repeat) (Kyepar la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kun tak) (repeat). Okay. (Kyepa) means "the details
of an object." The features of an object. Long, blue, white,
sharp, shiny, okay? And those are also to...when you think to
yourself "the pen is shiny" or "the pen is blue", or "the pen is
white", you're making a new construct. "The boy is?"

(students: Tashi)

Tashi. Tashi the boy is chubby. Okay. This is now a a feature
or a detail in ea in each case, you're making a new construct.
Okay. You can either construct about the basic object "pen" or
you can construct about features of the basic object, meaning
long, blue, shiny, okay pen. Yeah?

(student: When you say "construct" are you talking about ideas
or nouns or adjectives?)

We're talking about ideas and words. Okay. Either or or both.
Okay. You think it of as "pen" and you hear the word "pen" in
your mind, like that. You call it a pen, and you ca and you
visualize it as a pen or you, you conceptualize it as a pen.

(student: So if you're (da jang gyi kyebu)

It could be either one or both. You know, normally they say both
for a person who knows the name of the object. You are doing
both at the same time. You are thinking pen and you are
visualizing or conceptualizing "pen" in your mind. What is that
as opposed to the word? It's a it's a perfect mental image of
the thing as a pen. Okay. That you mistake for the pen. In the
Middle Way School is there something behind the pen? There is
but not such that if you kept looking you wouldn't find more. You
see what I mean? There's no end sense data. There's always
something behind that. Okay. In the Middle Way School it never
ends. What's the sign in the Middle Way School that something
does not exist by definition? When you look for the thing that
you are giving the name, you find it. If if anything existed
like that, it would exist by definition. Is there any such
thing...in the Middle Way School? No. Is there any such thing
in the Mind Only School? Oh god, there better be or there won't
be anything. (laughter) You see what I mean? Okay? You gotta
get used to that. One is an endless onion, peel after peel after
peel after peel and in the middle there's nothing, okay? One is
"oh yeah, you peel the first one but there's there's something
there", okay? That's Mind Only School. You gotta get used to
that. Yeah?

(student: What's the difference between these two flavors of
(kun taks) before you said there was a mental (unclear) which you
put something on there and then this (kun tak) is something that
receives something).

He says, "what's the difference between these two flavors of (kun
taks) and those...I think you're talking about the dart board as
being the thing that you throw the darts at, and the thing at
which the darts are thrown. We're not talking about that now.
We're not talking about that now. We're talking about two
different ways in which you conceptualize when you perceive an
object. Okay. You think of it either as "Tashi" or you think of
it as "Tashi's fat" or "Tashi crys a lot" or "Tashi's", you know,
"likes to drink milk a lot" or something like that. You're
thinking about details of Tashi. There're two ways of thinking
about an object. There're two ways of constructing mental ideas
about an object. Okay. Now we go back to the triangle. So
there's two ways to (kun tak) a (shen wang). Right? You can
either do it's basic thing, which is "pen" or you could detail,
"a pen is blue". There's two ways you could lay your ideas on
that object, okay? Either Tashi or Tashi's chubby, all right?
One is the basic thing, thinking of it as Tashi and one is the
detail, thinking of it as "Tashi, the chubby guy". Is there any
other way of thinking of the pen in the Mind Only School? Are
there only these two. Is those the only two flavors of (kun
taks) you can ever have about this (shen wang) right here? Is
there any other one you can have about it? I'll give you a clue.
 Is there any really wrong one you can have about it? Yeah, to
think that it is the thing that we call the pen from it's own
side. Okay. Does it deserve the word "pen" in and of itself,
okay? Is any object deserve the word it gets in and of itself?
In this school? No. Okay. (Kun taks) are not natural; (kun
taks) are made up. Okay. They do not...they are the only one of
the three groups that doesn't exist by?
(students: Definition)

Definition. Things don't get their names from their own sides.
You give them their names. To think that "pen" would be the
thing you call "pen" naturally and from it's own side, is
ignorance itself in this system. Is not understanding emptiness
in this system. (unclear) You wanna know what a Mind Only School
person thinks the (gak ja) is? What's the thing that emptiness
is empty of? A pen that could get the name pen by itself. All
of it's own right, okay. Not because I gave it the name pen, but
because it is pen from its' own side. It deserves the name pen,
it should have the name pen, okay. That in this school is
ignorance. That's another flavor of (kun tak). That's about the
same as that pumpkin that's squashing the the twi the twin
towers, okay. You can imagine it, right? Can you imagine a pen
that should be pen from its' own side? Can you imagine a pen
that should have been called pen by nature? You can imagine it.
Does it exist? No. In this school, no. Does...is your boss an
irritating person from his own side? Is your boss bad from his
own side? First of all, is he bad?

(students: Yes)

Yeah, he is. Don't think that Buddhism is saying your boss is
not bad. Don't think Buddhism is saying "that's an illusion",
"you can get over that," then you can walk around spaced out and
happy all the time...it's not like that. He is bad, you know.
Anyone who says the boss is not bad, let me drill your teeth with
a dental drill. Come...I've never had anyone take it.
You...never had anyone take up my offer, you know. If you think
that Buddhism is saying these things don't exist, or somehow he's
not bad, of course he's bad. Why? Prove it. He makes me feel
bad. That's reality. He does make me feel bad. Well, what'do
you mean when he says like an illusion? Well, it looks like he's
being bad from his own side, but I know better. He's being bad
because I'm perceiving him as bad because my old bad karma is
making me see him as bad and the stupidest thing in the world I
could ever do to my bad boss is...be bad to him, 'cause then I'd
see him again (laughter) you know what I mean (laughs).
(laughter) You know, the terminator, the eliminator, how do you
get rid of your bad boss? Be sweet, kind, compassionate,
knowledgable to...you know, then you'll never see him that way
again. You can change your whole reality into tantric angels all
around you. They are, or are they? No, not 'til you see them
that way, okay. You gotta get used to that, okay. So he is...is
a pen, the thing you call a pen, by definition? In the Mind Only
School? I'll say it again. Is the pen...is is a pen the thing
you call pen from it's own side?

(students: No)

No. And to think it is, is ignorance. Okay. And the lack of
that in the universe is called? Emptiness, okay. The total lack
in the universe of pens that get called pens from their own side
doesn't exist in the universe, that's emptiness. Okay. So we
got another (kun tak) here which is what? The wrong one. Let's
make it crooked, okay. This is where pen is what we call pen.
From it's own side. Pens is pens, no matter what, okay?
(laughter) Pens are what we call pen, why, because I made it up?
 No. 'Cause they they's called pens from their own side. That's
ignorance in this school. Do you think that about pens? Yes.
Is it correct? No, okay? And the fact that that there doesn't
exist any such thing as a pen that could get called pen because
it had some god-given right to be called pen, the fact that that
doesn't exist is, hey, guess what? (Yong drup). The...now the
triangle comes together. Okay, you gotta get used to that. You
ready? I'll do it one more time. These poor old (shen wangs)
are sitting around this room. How many? Oh about a zillion,
okay? There's (shen wangs) all around you. The people around
you are (shen wangs), the hairs in their noses are (shen wangs),
the dandruff on their hair is (shen wangs), the chairs are (shen
wangs), the school is (shen wang), New York City is a (shen
wang). Okay? Do you think of them in a correct way or a wrong
way? Both. Two correct ways and one wrong way. Give me the two
 correct way. Oh, I think about them as dandruff. That's
correct. That's about the essence of the object. I think about
it as kinda gross dandruff. That's a detail of the object.
Okay. Are they correct? (laughs) Yes, okay? Do they exist that
way? Yes. Can you think of them and conceptualize them that
way? Yes. Can you call them that, reasonably? Yes. Otherwise
they wouldn't see so much Head and Shoulders. (laughter) Okay.
You can think of them that way, okay, and you're not wrong.
Okay. That's not the (kun taks) we'se talking about. We're
talking about the (kun taks) that don't exist. What's the worst
one? Dandruff is dandruff...dandruff is what we call dandruff
from its own side. Dandruff is always bad, okay. Nowhere
there's never such a good thing as a good one. You know, it's
bad from its own side. I hate it, you know. I don't like
anybody who has dandruff. And I don't like it when I get it.
I'll spend anything not to have dandruff (laughter). You know,
oh the monks need food in India? It's okay, but I I gotta gotta
get rid of this dandruff first, you know (laughter) (laughs)
okay, okay, you know, okay, it's where you desire's overcoming
what you know to be right, you see what I mean? Because you
believe that it comes from its own..it is bad by itself, from its
own side. It deserves the name bad inately, from its own side.
It is always bad and it's the most important bad and it's more
important than people not getting fed at Sera Monastery, okay?
Like that. Okay. You believe that, okay? That would be dandruff
coming from its own side (laughs) okay. Does such a dandruff
exist? No, okay. That doesn't exist. Okay. And the fact that
that kind of dandruff doesn't exist is? (Yong drup) Okay. You
gotta get used to that. Each one of the three natures of the
Mind Only School...each one of the three attributes of the Mind
Only School creates the other two. You see. In other words, you
can say it this way, someone comes up to you and says "hey,
what're you doing over there in that school at night?" "I'm
studying the three attributes of the Mind Only School" system.
"Oh yeah? Well what's a (yong drup)?" "Oh a (yong drup) is the
absence of certain (kun taks) with certain (shen wangs).
(laughter) (laughs) Okay. Okay. Got it? Somebody comes up to
you "what a (yong)"...it's gonna happen on the street, I'm sure
(laughter), somebody come up and say, "what's a (yong drup)
anyway" and you say, "it's the fact that certain (kun taks) that
aren't true don't apply to all those (shen wangs) around here".
Like what? Well like the fact that your boss is called a bad
boss from his own side, okay. That's a (kun tak) that doesn't
exist. And the fact that that doesn't apply to the (shen wang)
called your boss is emptiness in the Mind Only School. You see.
You can say, you can say..(yong drup) equals (shenwangs) minus
certain (kun taks). (laughter) Okay. Really. And you must
start thinking like that. If you really want to understand the
Mind Only School, you gotta think like that. (Yong drups) equals
certain (shen wangs) minus the (kun taks) that don't apply to
them, because some (kun taks) do apply to them, right? It is a
pen. It's not a pen that's called a pen from its own side.
Okay. We how'r we gonna do the (kun taks)? I don't know.
(laughter) Let's forget that, okay. (laughs) (laughter) No. (Kun
taks) is, I don't know, (kun taks) help you to understand (shen
wangs), and some of them don't help you to understand (shen
wangs), you know. Some (kun taks) apply to (shen wangs) and some
don't apply to (shen wangs). When they don't apply to (shen
wangs), you get (yong drups). That's all. And that's that's how
the Buddha's playing with you in these three. He wants you to be
able to just switch them around like that. Okay? Yeah?

(student: In the third kind of (kun taks), the ones that don't
apply to (shen wangs))

Yeah

(student: are they the same thing as (gak jas)?)

Exactly. Beautiful question. Okay. He said...we talked about
three kinds of (kun taks). One is where you think of the pen as
a pen. That's okay. No problem. One is where you think of the
pen as long. No problem. It is long, or I mean, okay, let's say
thin, or whatever, okay, but what about the third one where you
think "it has a god-given right to be a pen". Okay. Does that
exist with this thing here? No. And and that, the absence of
that is emptiness in this school, called (yong drup). Okay. Now
his question was, is a pen, which has a god-given right to be
called a pen, is that (gak ja) in this school? Is that the thing
that emptiness is empty of? Is that what it means in this school
to be a self-existent thing? Yes. Good question, okay? Very
good question. Okay. (Gak ja) means the thing that emptiness is
empty of. What's our example for (gak ja) in this room?

(student: the elephant)
Two headed thirty foot purple elephant which is crushing people
at this moment, okay. Oh, that's not such a good example. That
never could exist anyway. Duh. Get it. (laughter) Self existent
things (laughs) self existent things could never exist either.
Okay. They are totally crazy, okay. They never existed, they
can't exist, they never will exist and you believe in them and
they cause you all your bad karma. You believe that the boss is
bad from the boss' side and you respond to the boss and you spin
the wheel one more time. You set it in motion one more time and
you continue to suffer. Because you don't get it. Okay? Yeah?

(student: Are there things in the Mind Only School that they
believe to be self-existent?)

John said, "are there things in the Mind Only School that they
believe to be self-existent?" There are about twenty words for
self-existent, okay. There are about twenty different words in
Madyamika, in Middle Way, for self-existent and they all mean the
same thing...I'll give you some of them: exist naturally; exist
from it's own side; exist by definition; exist truly, okay? Like
that. All those. Okay. But in the lower schools those mean
totally different things. In the lower schools you can exist by
definition and not exist in truth, or or like that. Okay. You
can you can be some of them and not other ones. They don't mean
exactly the same thing. The...in the Mind...in the Middle Way
School does anything exist by definition?

(students: No)

No. In the Mind Only School does anything exist by definition?
Yeah, this pen. Okay. Yeah? Oh, so the word self existent is a
little tricky, okay?

(student: So when you're saying that the Mind Only Schools says
that things exist by definition)

Yeah

(student: that's not accurate according to the Middle Way
School?)

John said, "if if I say the Mind Only School says this thing
exists by definition, would the Middle...is that is that accurate
according to the Middle Way School?" No. Okay. Does the Middle
Way School say that any object has some manner of existing from
its own side? No. Zero. Okay? In the Mind Only School? Oh god,
yes they do. Like what? Like my boss. Okay.

(student: Is that (unclear))

In this school to think of this pen as existing from its own side
would be a very correct (kun tak).

(student: (unclear))

Yeah, you could say that. To think that the essence of it, the
pen exists from its own side, yeah, that would be a detail I
think, in this school.

(student: (unclear))

No, no. It's it's understanding that the (kun tak) which is
wrong about it, that what it believes about it is not there, is
(yong drup). Okay. It...let's say that you believe that this
pen has a god-given right to be a pen. Okay. Then you are
grasping...in this school, to something that never existed. And
that is ignorance, and that causes you all your suffering.
That's why you're getting old, that's why you are going to die if
you don't figure it out in time. Okay? Very delicate. Very
important for our welfare. (laughs) You know.

(student: If you don't say the basis of the pen was inaccurate)

It is inaccurate, yeah. Yeah.

(student: So you're saying this is an accurate (kun tak) when it
seems to me that you're turning it around and saying it's
ignorance.)
No. Not at all. There are two accurate (kun taks) about the
pen. One that says "pen". The second that says "long pen". And
then there's a wrong (kun tak) about the pen that says, "that pen
has a god-given right to be called a pen". Okay. That one is
wrong. And the object that that holds onto is what emptiness is
empty of and always has been empty of and never was there in the
first place. And it happens to be the one that when you think
that way causes you all your suffering, okay? Yeah?

(student: Would it be fair to say that the thing that's wrong is
the thinking that the name is what is sort of naturally related
to the pen?)

She said, "can you describe then the wrong kind of (kun tak)ing
as thinking that the name some how naturally belongs to the pen",
 yeah, very close to that, very close to that. Whether or not I
think of it as a pen, it's a pen.

(student: (unclear))

Okay, he said, Dr. Ho said, "What what would Madyamika say about
those two correct ones", okay? They'd say that they don't exist
by definition and they'd say...but but they wouldn't describe
that in the same way that the Mind Only School describes it,
okay, they...because in Mind Only School, not existing by
definition means "anything which is just made up in your mind".
In the Mind Only School, not existing by definition means "it's
just made up in your mind". In the Middle Way School everything
is made up in your mind. Okay (laughs)

(student, Dr. Ho: (unclear))

Yeah, oh, in Mi...in ultimately in Middle Way School if you're
not an arya yet, you are misperceiving it all the time. Okay.
You you're misunderstanding it all the time...actively
misunderstanding it all the time.

(student, Dr. Ho: Is there no right (kun tak) in the Madyamika
school?)
He said, "is there no right (kun tak) in Madyamika School".

(student: (unclear) all illusions)

I guess you could say that, roughly. But then you'd have to get
into what does an arya see when he sees emptiness directly,
'cause he...that is correct. Okay. I got one more question for
you, all right? If I think of this pen as being a pen by a god-
given right...it has a god-given right to be called a pen, okay,
the pen is called a pen and that's true in all cases in all
places and naturally. This thing is called a pen, okay? Am I
seeing something there which is not there? Or am I thinking of
something in a way which it is not? Okay. Now I'll give you
this example again, okay. If I ask you to go into the hallway
back there and see if there's any coffee tables in the hallway
and you come back and say no, right, you're talking about a kind
of emptiness. All right. You're talking about the absence of
something. I I send you back there to see if there's a coffee
table in the hallway, and you come back and say no. Then you're
reporting the absence of something, okay. In Tibetan what is
that called? In Tibetan, all you Tibetan students, what's the
verb for that? It is there or it is not there? There's a whole

(student: (Me)

Yeah, (me), means "it's not there". What's the opposite of (me)?

(students: (yu))

(Yu). So in Tibetan you have a verb for "is" or "exist", (yu) or
(me). (Yu) means yeah, it's there in the hallway, there is a
table in the hallway. (Me) means, no, there is no table in the
hallway, okay? In Ti...in English you say "is". There isn't
any. Okay. But what you mean is, it exists or it doesn't exist
there. Okay. If you think about it, the English word "is" or
"is not" covers that, but also there's another verb in
Tibetan...what is it. It is a table, or it is not a table.

(student: (yin))
(Yin) or?

(student: (min))

(Min), okay? Say (yin) (repeat) (min) (repeat). That spotted
rope is not a real snake, okay? That speckled rope is not a
snake, okay. That's (yin) or (min) in Tibetan. In English you
use the word "is", okay, but do you get it? There is something
there, but is its' identity a real snake or not? It looks like a
snake, it's all coiled up...I was just walking through the
mountains in Arizona, they told me about Mojave ra...rattle
snakes

in starting in 2000 for a group of people and then they'll
prob...the rancher was even taking us around and showing us neat
valleys where we could have teachings for three weeks at a time.
So we'll probably twice a year during that three years we'll have
three week intensive teachings in like this huge tent out in the
meadows under the mountains. It's very beautiful. So. Keep you
up to date on that. Not not not decided totally yet. Okay. So
why does Lord Buddha...is it just random that he just picks these
three attributes, you know, (kun taks, shen wangs, yong drup).
Is it just random? Is he just, you know, we've talked about
already today that...who would think that up. I mean you're
sitting at your work place, you know, it's about time to eat
lunch, and then suddenly it occurs to you. "You know, you can
divide everything into (kun taks, shen wangs, and yong drups)"?
(laughter) You know what I mean? (laughs) I mean, it's not
something that would normally occur to you, you know. And then,
it's not like you spend all day thinking about, "oh, the pen is
like a dart board that I put my ascriptions on or my con
constructs on and it's like something that receives my
constructs, and by the way it's also a changing thing,"...you
don't go around thinking like that. Okay. So why did Lord
Buddha talk about that? Why did Lord Buddha make up these three
categories of stuff? What's the point of talking about things in
this way (kun taks, shen wangs, yong drups)...what's the point?
What's he trying to teach us? And this is where you get into the
interdependence of the three, okay. They are like a tripod.
Each one is defined by the other one and it's a very very
beautiful thing. If you get what I'm about to say, then you'll
understand the Mind Only School very well. You'll have a big big
insight into the Mind Only School. And the point is that each
one of those three helps the other two to exist, and they are
like three corners of a triangle, you see what I mean? Think of
it that way. Okay. And we'll go into it now. Why did Lord
Buddha start talking about, you know, if somebody came up to Elly
Vander Pas, you know, Jigme Pelmo said, "why do you talk about
(shen wangs), why do you talk about dependent things?" and her
answer is out of left-field...what do you call it...oh because
they're the object that you imagine about. So why are you
talking like that? Why don't you just say that they're things
that change, they're things that have causes, they're things
that, you know, why do you describe things as "oh, those are the
things that you lay your constructs on", you know. Why does Lord
Buddha talk like that? When he's describing plain old changing
stuff around us. He's trying to get you to think about (kun
taks). Okay. So think of it as a triangle. And you're gonna
get really good at it. We're gonna talk about it. We're gonna
talk about it, okay. I think, it..you know, do (kun taks) apply
to (shen wangs)? Do (shen wangs) apply to (yong drups) apply to
(shen wangs)? Do (yong drups) apply to (kun taks)? Do (kun
taks) relate to (shen wangs)? The whole point is yeah, they
define each other, okay? The crux is here. The crux is here.
(Shen wangs), okay, the things around you, ninety-nine point nine
nine nine percent of your experience is the changing things
around you, okay? We start from there. These are the basis.
This is why Lord Buddha, in responding about the three attributes
to the Bodhisattva brings up what? (Shen wangs). Everything is
from the point of view of (shen wangs). (Shen wangs) is what
gets called "things". Okay. (Shen wang) is the thing that
receives the names of things. (Shen wangs) is the changing
things. You wanna know what those three are? Why does he go
straight for (shen wangs)? Why doesn't he talk a little bit
about (kun taks)? Why doesn't he talk a little bit about (yong
drups)? (Shen wangs) are the basis of everything. Okay. Think
of (shen wangs) as the the basis of the whole conversation.
(Shen wangs), the things around you, okay, which are primarily
(kun jung den pa) and (dun yang den pa) meaning what? Suffering
and the truth of...the source of suffering. Okay. Ninety nine
point nine nine nine percent of the things around you are
changing. And exactly that many are suffering, okay? They are
either mental affliction or caused by mental affliction, or about
to give you new mental afflictions (laughter) okay? (laughs) All
right? Everything around you is totally tied up with suffering
and mental afflictions. Let's talk about those first, okay.
They are the basis. Think of them as the basis. The whole Mind
Only School is based or founded upon (shen wangs), changing
things. Okay. What can you say about those changing things? Oh,
I I think about them in certain ways. I (kun tak)ize them
(laughter). Okay. I think about them in certain ways. What are
the two ways I think about them? Well there's two flavors of
(kun taks). Here's one. Say (ngowo la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kuntak) (repeat) (Ngowo la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kuntak) (repeat). Two ways that you (kun tak)ize
things. Okay.

(cut)

two ways that you imagine things, two ways that you construct
about things, two things, two ways that you create your mental
images about things, and the first one is called (ngowo la
kuntakpay kuntak). (Ngowo) means "the essence of an object",
okay, (ngowo) means "the essence of an object". (Ngowo la
kuntakpay kuntak) means "a (kuntak) which is (kuntak)ed about the
essence of a thing". Meaning what? A construct that you
construct about the essence of a thing. The construct that you
construct about the essence of a thing. What's an example? Pen.
 That's all. Okay. Pen. Okay. What's the famous one from
Abendigo, Australia? Car. (laughs) Okay. Car. We had these
guys go around saying "car" for ten days (laughter). They're
sitting in front of the campfire out in Abendigo, Australia,
"car, car" (laughs) you know, okay, "car". The car is a concept
about the essence of that thing. Okay. Pen. Pen. The
construct pen. Call it a verbalization if you are a (da jang gyi
kyebu), if you know the words for things. Call it a a mental
construct if you don't, or or maybe you do both, okay. You think
of it as a pen. That's a construct. Okay. Thinking of it as a
pen is a construct, okay. That's about the essence of the pen.
Now you know what's coming next. What? What would be the second
kind of (kun tak)? If the if the basic one is to think pen, what
would be the second one?

(students: name)

Huh?

(students: Name)

But...no, the first one, they're both labels. The first one is
labeling it about its basic nature. And then what would the
second one be?

(student: It's qualities)

Yeah, it's various qualities. Blue. Long. Sharp. Okay. What.
Here's the second one. Say (kyepar la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kun tak) (repeat) (Kyepar la) (repeat) (kuntakpay)
(repeat) (kun tak) (repeat). Okay. (Kyepa) means "the details
of an object." The features of an object. Long, blue, white,
sharp, shiny, okay? And those are also to...when you think to
yourself "the pen is shiny" or "the pen is blue", or "the pen is
white", you're making a new construct. "The boy is?"

(students: Tashi)

Tashi. Tashi the boy is chubby. Okay. This is now a a feature
or a detail in ea in each case, you're making a new construct.
Okay. You can either construct about the basic object "pen" or
you can construct about features of the basic object, meaning
long, blue, shiny, okay pen. Yeah?

(student: When you say "construct" are you talking about ideas
or nouns or adjectives?)

We're talking about ideas and words. Okay. Either or or both.
Okay. You think it of as "pen" and you hear the word "pen" in
your mind, like that. You call it a pen, and you ca and you
visualize it as a pen or you, you conceptualize it as a pen.
(student: So if you're (da jang gyi kyebu)

It could be either one or both. You know, normally they say both
for a person who knows the name of the object. You are doing
both at the same time. You are thinking pen and you are
visualizing or conceptualizing "pen" in your mind. What is that
as opposed to the word? It's a it's a perfect mental image of
the thing as a pen. Okay. That you mistake for the pen. In the
Middle Way School is there something behind the pen? There is
but not such that if you kept looking you wouldn't find more. You
see what I mean? There's no end sense data. There's always
something behind that. Okay. In the Middle Way School it never
ends. What's the sign in the Middle Way School that something
does not exist by definition? When you look for the thing that
you are giving the name, you find it. If if anything existed
like that, it would exist by definition. Is there any such
thing...in the Middle Way School? No. Is there any such thing
in the Mind Only School? Oh god, there better be or there won't
be anything. (laughter) You see what I mean? Okay? You gotta
get used to that. One is an endless onion, peel after peel after
peel after peel and in the middle there's nothing, okay? One is
"oh yeah, you peel the first one but there's there's something
there", okay? That's Mind Only School. You gotta get used to
that. Yeah?

(student: What's the difference between these two flavors of
(kun taks) before you said there was a mental (unclear) which you
put something on there and then this (kun tak) is something that
receives something).

He says, "what's the difference between these two flavors of (kun
taks) and those...I think you're talking about the dart board as
being the thing that you throw the darts at, and the thing at
which the darts are thrown. We're not talking about that now.
We're not talking about that now. We're talking about two
different ways in which you conceptualize when you perceive an
object. Okay. You think of it either as "Tashi" or you think of
it as "Tashi's fat" or "Tashi crys a lot" or "Tashi's", you know,
"likes to drink milk a lot" or something like that. You're
thinking about details of Tashi. There're two ways of thinking
about an object. There're two ways of constructing mental ideas
about an object. Okay. Now we go back to the triangle. So
there's two ways to (kun tak) a (shen wang). Right? You can
either do it's basic thing, which is "pen" or you could detail,
"a pen is blue". There's two ways you could lay your ideas on
that object, okay? Either Tashi or Tashi's chubby, all right?
One is the basic thing, thinking of it as Tashi and one is the
detail, thinking of it as "Tashi, the chubby guy". Is there any
other way of thinking of the pen in the Mind Only School? Are
there only these two. Is those the only two flavors of (kun
taks) you can ever have about this (shen wang) right here? Is
there any other one you can have about it? I'll give you a clue.
 Is there any really wrong one you can have about it? Yeah, to
think that it is the thing that we call the pen from it's own
side. Okay. Does it deserve the word "pen" in and of itself,
okay? Is any object deserve the word it gets in and of itself?
In this school? No. Okay. (Kun taks) are not natural; (kun
taks) are made up. Okay. They do not...they are the only one of
the three groups that doesn't exist by?

(students: Definition)

Definition. Things don't get their names from their own sides.
You give them their names. To think that "pen" would be the
thing you call "pen" naturally and from it's own side, is
ignorance itself in this system. Is not understanding emptiness
in this system. (unclear) You wanna know what a Mind Only School
person thinks the (gak ja) is? What's the thing that emptiness
is empty of? A pen that could get the name pen by itself. All
of it's own right, okay. Not because I gave it the name pen, but
because it is pen from its' own side. It deserves the name pen,
it should have the name pen, okay. That in this school is
ignorance. That's another flavor of (kun tak). That's about the
same as that pumpkin that's squashing the the twi the twin
towers, okay. You can imagine it, right? Can you imagine a pen
that should be pen from its' own side? Can you imagine a pen
that should have been called pen by nature? You can imagine it.
Does it exist? No. In this school, no. Does...is your boss an
irritating person from his own side? Is your boss bad from his
own side? First of all, is he bad?
(students: Yes)

Yeah, he is. Don't think that Buddhism is saying your boss is
not bad. Don't think Buddhism is saying "that's an illusion",
"you can get over that," then you can walk around spaced out and
happy all the time...it's not like that. He is bad, you know.
Anyone who says the boss is not bad, let me drill your teeth with
a dental drill. Come...I've never had anyone take it.
You...never had anyone take up my offer, you know. If you think
that Buddhism is saying these things don't exist, or somehow he's
not bad, of course he's bad. Why? Prove it. He makes me feel
bad. That's reality. He does make me feel bad. Well, what'do
you mean when he says like an illusion? Well, it looks like he's
being bad from his own side, but I know better. He's being bad
because I'm perceiving him as bad because my old bad karma is
making me see him as bad and the stupidest thing in the world I
could ever do to my bad boss is...be bad to him, 'cause then I'd
see him again (laughter) you know what I mean (laughs).
(laughter) You know, the terminator, the eliminator, how do you
get rid of your bad boss? Be sweet, kind, compassionate,
knowledgable to...you know, then you'll never see him that way
again. You can change your whole reality into tantric angels all
around you. They are, or are they? No, not 'til you see them
that way, okay. You gotta get used to that, okay. So he is...is
a pen, the thing you call a pen, by definition? In the Mind Only
School? I'll say it again. Is the pen...is is a pen the thing
you call pen from it's own side?

(students: No)

No. And to think it is, is ignorance. Okay. And the lack of
that in the universe is called? Emptiness, okay. The total lack
in the universe of pens that get called pens from their own side
doesn't exist in the universe, that's emptiness. Okay. So we
got another (kun tak) here which is what? The wrong one. Let's
make it crooked, okay. This is where pen is what we call pen.
From it's own side. Pens is pens, no matter what, okay?
(laughter) Pens are what we call pen, why, because I made it up?
 No. 'Cause they they's called pens from their own side. That's
ignorance in this school. Do you think that about pens? Yes.
Is it correct? No, okay? And the fact that that there doesn't
exist any such thing as a pen that could get called pen because
it had some god-given right to be called pen, the fact that that
doesn't exist is, hey, guess what? (Yong drup). The...now the
triangle comes together. Okay, you gotta get used to that. You
ready? I'll do it one more time. These poor old (shen wangs)
are sitting around this room. How many? Oh about a zillion,
okay? There's (shen wangs) all around you. The people around
you are (shen wangs), the hairs in their noses are (shen wangs),
the dandruff on their hair is (shen wangs), the chairs are (shen
wangs), the school is (shen wang), New York City is a (shen
wang). Okay? Do you think of them in a correct way or a wrong
way? Both. Two correct ways and one wrong way. Give me the two
 correct way. Oh, I think about them as dandruff. That's
correct. That's about the essence of the object. I think about
it as kinda gross dandruff. That's a detail of the object.
Okay. Are they correct? (laughs) Yes, okay? Do they exist that
way? Yes. Can you think of them and conceptualize them that
way? Yes. Can you call them that, reasonably? Yes. Otherwise
they wouldn't see so much Head and Shoulders. (laughter) Okay.
You can think of them that way, okay, and you're not wrong.
Okay. That's not the (kun taks) we'se talking about. We're
talking about the (kun taks) that don't exist. What's the worst
one? Dandruff is dandruff...dandruff is what we call dandruff
from its own side. Dandruff is always bad, okay. Nowhere
there's never such a good thing as a good one. You know, it's
bad from its own side. I hate it, you know. I don't like
anybody who has dandruff. And I don't like it when I get it.
I'll spend anything not to have dandruff (laughter). You know,
oh the monks need food in India? It's okay, but I I gotta gotta
get rid of this dandruff first, you know (laughter) (laughs)
okay, okay, you know, okay, it's where you desire's overcoming
what you know to be right, you see what I mean? Because you
believe that it comes from its own..it is bad by itself, from its
own side. It deserves the name bad inately, from its own side.
It is always bad and it's the most important bad and it's more
important than people not getting fed at Sera Monastery, okay?
Like that. Okay. You believe that, okay? That would be dandruff
coming from its own side (laughs) okay. Does such a dandruff
exist? No, okay. That doesn't exist. Okay. And the fact that
that kind of dandruff doesn't exist is? (Yong drup) Okay. You
gotta get used to that. Each one of the three natures of the
Mind Only School...each one of the three attributes of the Mind
Only School creates the other two. You see. In other words, you
can say it this way, someone comes up to you and says "hey,
what're you doing over there in that school at night?" "I'm
studying the three attributes of the Mind Only School" system.
"Oh yeah? Well what's a (yong drup)?" "Oh a (yong drup) is the
absence of certain (kun taks) with certain (shen wangs).
(laughter) (laughs) Okay. Okay. Got it? Somebody comes up to
you "what a (yong)"...it's gonna happen on the street, I'm sure
(laughter), somebody come up and say, "what's a (yong drup)
anyway" and you say, "it's the fact that certain (kun taks) that
aren't true don't apply to all those (shen wangs) around here".
Like what? Well like the fact that your boss is called a bad
boss from his own side, okay. That's a (kun tak) that doesn't
exist. And the fact that that doesn't apply to the (shen wang)
called your boss is emptiness in the Mind Only School. You see.
You can say, you can say..(yong drup) equals (shenwangs) minus
certain (kun taks). (laughter) Okay. Really. And you must
start thinking like that. If you really want to understand the
Mind Only School, you gotta think like that. (Yong drups) equals
certain (shen wangs) minus the (kun taks) that don't apply to
them, because some (kun taks) do apply to them, right? It is a
pen. It's not a pen that's called a pen from its own side.
Okay. We how'r we gonna do the (kun taks)? I don't know.
(laughter) Let's forget that, okay. (laughs) (laughter) No. (Kun
taks) is, I don't know, (kun taks) help you to understand (shen
wangs), and some of them don't help you to understand (shen
wangs), you know. Some (kun taks) apply to (shen wangs) and some
don't apply to (shen wangs). When they don't apply to (shen
wangs), you get (yong drups). That's all. And that's that's how
the Buddha's playing with you in these three. He wants you to be
able to just switch them around like that. Okay? Yeah?

(student: In the third kind of (kun taks), the ones that don't
apply to (shen wangs))

Yeah
(student: are they the same thing as (gak jas)?)

Exactly. Beautiful question. Okay. He said...we talked about
three kinds of (kun taks). One is where you think of the pen as
a pen. That's okay. No problem. One is where you think of the
pen as long. No problem. It is long, or I mean, okay, let's say
thin, or whatever, okay, but what about the third one where you
think "it has a god-given right to be a pen". Okay. Does that
exist with this thing here? No. And and that, the absence of
that is emptiness in this school, called (yong drup). Okay. Now
his question was, is a pen, which has a god-given right to be
called a pen, is that (gak ja) in this school? Is that the thing
that emptiness is empty of? Is that what it means in this school
to be a self-existent thing? Yes. Good question, okay? Very
good question. Okay. (Gak ja) means the thing that emptiness is
empty of. What's our example for (gak ja) in this room?

(student: the elephant)

Two headed thirty foot purple elephant which is crushing people
at this moment, okay. Oh, that's not such a good example. That
never could exist anyway. Duh. Get it. (laughter) Self existent
things (laughs) self existent things could never exist either.
Okay. They are totally crazy, okay. They never existed, they
can't exist, they never will exist and you believe in them and
they cause you all your bad karma. You believe that the boss is
bad from the boss' side and you respond to the boss and you spin
the wheel one more time. You set it in motion one more time and
you continue to suffer. Because you don't get it. Okay? Yeah?

(student: Are there things in the Mind Only School that they
believe to be self-existent?)

John said, "are there things in the Mind Only School that they
believe to be self-existent?" There are about twenty words for
self-existent, okay. There are about twenty different words in
Madyamika, in Middle Way, for self-existent and they all mean the
same thing...I'll give you some of them: exist naturally; exist
from it's own side; exist by definition; exist truly, okay? Like
that. All those. Okay. But in the lower schools those mean
totally different things. In the lower schools you can exist by
definition and not exist in truth, or or like that. Okay. You
can you can be some of them and not other ones. They don't mean
exactly the same thing. The...in the Mind...in the Middle Way
School does anything exist by definition?

(students: No)

No. In the Mind Only School does anything exist by definition?
Yeah, this pen. Okay. Yeah? Oh, so the word self existent is a
little tricky, okay?

(student: So when you're saying that the Mind Only Schools says
that things exist by definition)

Yeah

(student: that's not accurate according to the Middle Way
School?)

John said, "if if I say the Mind Only School says this thing
exists by definition, would the Middle...is that is that accurate
according to the Middle Way School?" No. Okay. Does the Middle
Way School say that any object has some manner of existing from
its own side? No. Zero. Okay? In the Mind Only School? Oh god,
yes they do. Like what? Like my boss. Okay.

(student: Is that (unclear))

In this school to think of this pen as existing from its own side
would be a very correct (kun tak).

(student: (unclear))

Yeah, you could say that. To think that the essence of it, the
pen exists from its own side, yeah, that would be a detail I
think, in this school.

(student: (unclear))
No, no. It's it's understanding that the (kun tak) which is
wrong about it, that what it believes about it is not there, is
(yong drup). Okay. It...let's say that you believe that this
pen has a god-given right to be a pen. Okay. Then you are
grasping...in this school, to something that never existed. And
that is ignorance, and that causes you all your suffering.
That's why you're getting old, that's why you are going to die if
you don't figure it out in time. Okay? Very delicate. Very
important for our welfare. (laughs) You know.

(student: If you don't say the basis of the pen was inaccurate)

It is inaccurate, yeah. Yeah.

(student: So you're saying this is an accurate (kun tak) when it
seems to me that you're turning it around and saying it's
ignorance.)

No. Not at all. There are two accurate (kun taks) about the
pen. One that says "pen". The second that says "long pen". And
then there's a wrong (kun tak) about the pen that says, "that pen
has a god-given right to be called a pen". Okay. That one is
wrong. And the object that that holds onto is what emptiness is
empty of and always has been empty of and never was there in the
first place. And it happens to be the one that when you think
that way causes you all your suffering, okay? Yeah?

(student: Would it be fair to say that the thing that's wrong is
the thinking that the name is what is sort of naturally related
to the pen?)

She said, "can you describe then the wrong kind of (kun tak)ing
as thinking that the name some how naturally belongs to the pen",
 yeah, very close to that, very close to that. Whether or not I
think of it as a pen, it's a pen.

(student: (unclear))

Okay, he said, Dr. Ho said, "What what would Madyamika say about
those two correct ones", okay? They'd say that they don't exist
by definition and they'd say...but but they wouldn't describe
that in the same way that the Mind Only School describes it,
okay, they...because in Mind Only School, not existing by
definition means "anything which is just made up in your mind".
In the Mind Only School, not existing by definition means "it's
just made up in your mind". In the Middle Way School everything
is made up in your mind. Okay (laughs)

(student, Dr. Ho: (unclear))

Yeah, oh, in Mi...in ultimately in Middle Way School if you're
not an arya yet, you are misperceiving it all the time. Okay.
You you're misunderstanding it all the time...actively
misunderstanding it all the time.

(student, Dr. Ho: Is there no right (kun tak) in the Madyamika
school?)

He said, "is there no right (kun tak) in Madyamika School".

(student: (unclear) all illusions)

I guess you could say that, roughly. But then you'd have to get
into what does an arya see when he sees emptiness directly,
'cause he...that is correct. Okay. I got one more question for
you, all right? If I think of this pen as being a pen by a god-
given right...it has a god-given right to be called a pen, okay,
the pen is called a pen and that's true in all cases in all
places and naturally. This thing is called a pen, okay? Am I
seeing something there which is not there? Or am I thinking of
something in a way which it is not? Okay. Now I'll give you
this example again, okay. If I ask you to go into the hallway
back there and see if there's any coffee tables in the hallway
and you come back and say no, right, you're talking about a kind
of emptiness. All right. You're talking about the absence of
something. I I send you back there to see if there's a coffee
table in the hallway, and you come back and say no. Then you're
reporting the absence of something, okay. In Tibetan what is
that called? In Tibetan, all you Tibetan students, what's the
verb for that? It is there or it is not there? There's a whole

(student: (Me)

Yeah, (me), means "it's not there". What's the opposite of (me)?

(students: (yu))

(Yu). So in Tibetan you have a verb for "is" or "exist", (yu) or
(me). (Yu) means yeah, it's there in the hallway, there is a
table in the hallway. (Me) means, no, there is no table in the
hallway, okay? In Ti...in English you say "is". There isn't
any. Okay. But what you mean is, it exists or it doesn't exist
there. Okay. If you think about it, the English word "is" or
"is not" covers that, but also there's another verb in
Tibetan...what is it. It is a table, or it is not a table.

(student: (yin))

(Yin) or?

(student: (min))

(Min), okay? Say (yin) (repeat) (min) (repeat). That spotted
rope is not a real snake, okay? That speckled rope is not a
snake, okay. That's (yin) or (min) in Tibetan. In English you
use the word "is", okay, but do you get it? There is something
there, but is its' identity a real snake or not? It looks like a
snake, it's all coiled up...I was just walking through the
mountains in Arizona, they told me about Mojave ra...rattle
snakes



They said, "better to run into a diamond back" (laughter). You
know, they just paralize you for a couple days. Mojaves there's
no cure (laughs) okay, and they're like "and there's a lot of
them on that mountain. See you later", you know. (laughs)
(laughter) And so I'm like walking around the mountain...they
said make lots of noise...I'm like whistling and singing, you
know, like that, then suddenly you see this...it's dusk...and you
see this thing curled up, you know, and you're not like gonna ask
questions, you're just gonna run, right? But it's...that's a
question of (yin) or (min). Is it a snake or not, okay? Is that
coiled shape a snake or not. That's (yin) or (min). Okay. It's
not a question of whether there's a coil there or not. It's not
(yu) or (me), it's (yin) or (min). And the point of this, of
this, is that when you're doing the wrong kind of (kun tak)ing,
in this context, okay, in this context...really what you're doing
is a (yin-min) thing or a (yu-me) thing?

(students: (yin-min))

It's a (yin min) thing, and that's a Je Tson...when you get in
the reading, which by the way you should have noticed by now that
the readings are impossible, okay (laughter) (laughs) don't get
nervous, okay, I mean people throughout the last five hundred
years have tried to figure out those readings. Don't worry about
it. There are thousands and thousands of pages written on those
words that you see there. There are thousands and thousands of
pages written in different languages to explain the words of the
sutra in particular. Okay. Very very very difficult. You can
not understand it without an oral explanation. Okay. But you
will see in the reading this time that Je Tsongkapa is drawing a
distinction. He says, when you think about it, the wrong kind of
(kun tak)ing is really a question of misidentifying something,
you see? There is a person there. There is a pen there. Do we
call it a pen? Yes. Do we give it labels as far as its features
and its details? Yes. Okay. And you're just thinking of it as
a pen that exists from its own side or a pen...I'm sorry, not in
this school...a pen that should be called a pen from its own
side. That doesn't exist by definition. By the way, quick
question, in this school, does the pen exist from its own side?

(students: Yes)

Does the fact that the pen is called a pen exist from its own
side?

(students: No)
Great. Great. (Kun taks) do not exist by definition. (Shen
wangs) do exist by definition. Okay. Now the tricky one. Does
the fact that the pen is not called the pen from its own side,
okay, exist or not?

(students: No...yes)

Yeah. (laughs) Is the pen absent of exist...of being called a
pen from its own side?

(students: yes)

And that's emptiness in this school. Got it? They all they all
support each other. I'll do it one more time. Okay. (laughter)
 Is there a pen here? In this school?

(students: Yes)

Does it exist from its own side, in this school?

(students: Yes)

Does it exist by definition, in this school?

(students: Yes)

Yes. Yeah. Th the pen, the (shen wang). Okay. Does it exist
from its own side? Yes. Does it exist by definition, in this
school?

(students: Yes)

Mind Only, Mind Only, okay? Forget that Middle Way stuff. You
graduated, right, or you got demoted, I don't know. (laughter)
Okay. (laughs) When I think of it as a pen, am I correct?

(students: No)

When when I create a concept of it as a pen, am I cor, am I
correct?
(students: Yes)

Yeah, that's a good (kun tak). When I think of it as a blue pen
or as a white pen, am I having a good (kun tak)?

(students: Yes)

Yeah. When I think of it as being called...being the thing
that's called a pen from its own side, am I correct?

(students: No.)

No, okay. Does the fact that the pen is called the pen from its
own side even exist?

(students: Yes. No)

Careful, I'm not saying the idea, the fact. I'll say it again.
Does the fact that the pen is called the pen from its own side
even exist in the universe?

(students: No)

And that's emptiness in this school, okay? Got it? Got it?
Okay? (Shen), I'm sorry, (yong drup) is the fact that the bad
(kun taks) don't apply to this (shen wang). That's (yong drup)
Okay. Yeah.

(student: So what do you (unclear) one plus one equals two,
right?)

Yeah.

(student: Is that two from its own side or?)

Yeah, in this school, one plus one is two...that's pretty tricky.
 I'd have to call it a (kun tak). I'd have to say no, it doesn't
exist.
(student: That that blue (unclear)

Yeah, that's a concept and it does not change. It's a (kun tak),
it's in my thinking, one plus one is two is a fact, and in this
school that's a (kun tak) and it's an imaginary thing.

(student: So can can you talk about that as existing from its
own side or)

No, in this school, it does...it's the only thing that doesn't
exist from its own side, okay?

(student: All (kun tak))

It's a (kun tak)...yeah, all the (kun taks) don't exist from
their own side. Yeah.

(student: (unclear) so then the Mind Only version of emptiness
is really that it's only empty of labels.)

He said, "then the Mind Only version of emptiness is that its
empty of labels". No. That's not it. The Mind Only version of
emptiness is that its empty of labels that could have been
applied to it naturally. Labels...the fact that it was labeled
what it's labeled naturally, doesn't exist, and that's emptiness.
Okay. The fact that it, that it doesn't have labels in this
school is a falsity. Everything has a label, okay? All right.
Yeah.

(student: Is one plus one equals two the same as Tashi?)
(laughter)

Yeah, they're both (kun taks).

(student: The same kind of)

No, yeah, no...I wouldn't call them the same kind of (kun taks),
but they are both (kun taks).

(student: (unclear))
No, I wouldn't call them both...one is a fact, you know, one is a
mathematical fact.

(student: (unclear)you say that everything has a label, right?
Everything is labeled)

You can say everything is labeled. Every (shen wang) has it's
(kun tak). (laughter) That's all. Yeah.

(student: (unclear) every (shen wang) is a (kun tak) itself)

No. Every (shen wang) is a (kun tak)...(kun taks) don't change;
(shen wangs) change all the time. You weren't in the first
class. (laughs)

(student: These are two different (kun taks))

Both of them are unchanging. The pen is long. It's a fact.
Okay? The pen is a pen. That's a fact. Is the pen a pen from
its own side? Is is the...does the pen deserve the name pen from
its own side? No. Why? 'Cause that's a (kun tak), that's an
imaginary thing, it doesn't exist by definition. Did you have a
question?

(student: I was just thinking that one plus one might be one
thing but one pen plus one pen might be different, because you're
talking about something that is (unclear)

She said, "she said one plus one equals two and one plen plus one
pen?

(student: Un huh. Equals two pens)

Equals two pens? It's also a fact, and that makes it a (kun
tak). Sorry. (laughter)

(student: Can a (shen wang) have several (kun taks)?

He said, "Can a (shen wang) have several (kun taks)? They have
limitless (kun taks).

(student: a few things that that would just came up when you say
"this is a pen" or a tubal object? So can there be from one side
be the (kun tak) of a pen and from the other side a (kun tak) of)
Okay, Axle is stuck in the Middle Way, (laughter) okay? He he
keeps wan...he no, and it's a natural question, he wants to know,
can can one (shen wang), this (shen wang) here have multiple (kun
taks). Could you think of it as a pen and could you think of it
as an estrudible object at the same time? And what do you think?
 In this school?

(students: Yes Yes)

Don't forget it exists by definition. In this school that means
what?

(student: It has its own)

It has its own unique identity from its own way, from its own
side. It's a pen. That stupid dog is chewing on a pen.
(laughter) Okay. Okay? Okay? Yeah.

(student: If they...if they believe that then how do you become
a Buddha because of some essence) (laughs) (laughter)

No, she said, "if you believe that then how could you ever become
a Buddha?" You see, because in essence, you would be existing in
essence, you'd be existing by definition. You could not change
into a Buddha. It's a beautiful question. Okay. Until you
graduate to thinking about your own body and mind as something
which is which is a construct, right, you can never become a
Buddha, you is stuck in a suffering world, until you reach
Madyamika, until you reach Nagarjuna's viewpoint, you cannot
become a Buddha. Forget practicing (tantra), okay, as long as
you hold Middle Way...I'm sorry, Mind Only way of thinking of
things, you aren't eligible to become a Buddha anymore, because
you is self-existently a suffering human samsaric being. And you
could never be any different because you exist from your own side
that way. Impossible to become a Buddha. It's exactly the
Middle Way's complaint about the Mind Only School. Hey if you
guys are right, I'm stuck here forever. I might as well have a
Bud Light. (laughter) You know. (laughter) I'm stuck here
forever. If I exist from my own side as a suffering dying, and
you believe that, you're Mind Only School, you believe you have
to get old and die. You really believe that. When I get up and
spout about that stuff, you're like, half your mind's like "oh
there he goes again", you know (laughter), that stuff...you
really believe that. You hold that to be true. You hold that to
be existent. You hold death itself and the aging process to
exist from its own side, mainly 'cause you've never saw anything
else. Yeah?

(student: (unclear) school have its own explanation for how they
become Buddhas or do they think they don't have that option.)

Does the Mind Only School recognize or admit that their viewpoint
disqualifies them all from becoming Buddhas? (laughter) No. Of
course not. They say all you crazy Middle Way people, you know,
according to you nothing exists. We're gonna get into that. How
could I become a Buddha? I don't even exist according to you.
(laughter), you know. No, seriously, to hear Mind Only School
complain about Middle Way School it's very...it's cute.
(laughter) (laughs) It's very cute. They're like, "yeah,
according to you I don't have a nose, right, so I don't have to
blow any more, right? (laughter) (laughs) Okay. Let's see here.
 I think we covered everything. Okay, one last thing. It really
is the last thing. I didn't have enough homework questions, so I
threw in a filler question. And that was, you know, Lord Buddha,
when he describes the three attributes he has to take an example,
right, he has to say, here's a real example. We've been taking
Tashi, but you could also do it about a pen, okay? Is this one
of the five skandas, or the five heaps?

(students: yeah)

Yeah. Okay. Physical matter. When you talk about the five
parts of a person, you're mainly talking about number one is
their physical body, right, suki pumbo rupa skanda, the the heap
of physical matter. But you can also talk about the things in
your experience, you see? Not just the things you can touch,
okay? This is this is part of my world as much as this is part
of my world, okay? And and like that, you can div...roughly you
can divide it the the five heaps that way, okay. So, Lord
Buddha's been talking all this stuff about physical matter. That
whole conversation tonight, the boy Tashi, that blob, the noisy
blob physical matter weighs something, okay? The pen physical
matter, and we just got through explaining how the three
characteristics support each other. Where's the (shen wang)? In
my head. Okay. What's your (kun taks) about it? It's a pen.
It's a long pen. It's a pen that deserves the name pen from its
own side. Two right ones and one wrong one, okay? Where's the
(yong drup) here? The fact that that last one's not true about
this pen is its emptiness. Got it? Okay. Got it? So Lord
Buddha has finished proving it to you about a physical object.
Now what's the next place for him to go? How 'bout the rest of
the four skandas? How 'bout the other four heaps or parts of a
person? What's number two? Your feelings. Your feelings. Feel
good, feel bad. Okay. What's the third one?

(students: Discriminations)

Your discrimination. Good boy. Bad boy. I like her. I don't
like him, okay. What's the fourth one? All the other stuff
about you. Like your all your other mental function or you,
okay? And what's the fifth one?

(student: Your consciousness)

Your consciousness, okay. So he covers it with the other five
skandas. In the sutra he says, "hey, when I meant that"...what's
he talking about by the way? Are we talking about first turning
of the wheel, second turning of the wheel or third turning of the
wheel?

(students: First)

First. First. That's where he set the groundwork, right?
That's where he said, "hey by the way, this is true of your
physical body, this is true of you feelings, this is true of your
discrimination, this is true of everything else about you, and by
the way, this is also true about your mind. What? These three
things...I'm talking about these three things. What? (kun taks,
shen wangs, yong drup). You can establish them with your pen,
you can establish them with your hand, and you can establish them
with your feelings, your discrimination, the other parts of you
and your consciousness. We just covered the five heaps. That's
what I meant in the first turning of the wheel. Okay. 'Cause
that's when he brought up the five heaps. In the first turning
of the wheel. What else did he bring up in the first turning of
the wheel? What was the first thing he ever taught?

(students: Four Noble Truths)

Four arya truths, please. We threw out "noble" with all those
other, you know...why "arya" truths by the way?

(student: Perceived only by an arya)

First perceived directly by a person who sees emptiness directly,
in the aftermath. (Je to bye she.) In the hours after he sees
emptiness directly, or she, that's why they're called "arya"
truths, okay? So he says, then he goes and proves about the four
arya truths. The same three qualities. What? (Kun taks, shen
wangs, yong drup). You can prove them about the four n...arya
truths. Oops. Almost said "noble", okay (laughter). (laughs)
What else can you talk to the...oh, how about the twelve doors of
sense. How 'bout the eighteen parts of the universe, the
eighteen divisions of the universe? How 'bout the six elements?
You see what I mean? He goes through all the subjects of his
first turning of the wheel and he proves that each one of them
has? (Kun taks, shen wangs and yong drups). Every one of them
has their own (kun taks). Every one of them has their own (shen
wangs). Every one of them has their own (yong drup). And each
one of those forms a triangle. And each supports the other one,
okay? What is emptiness in the Mind Only School? The fact that
certain wrong (kun taks) don't apply to certain (shen wangs).
That's all. Okay. So on the...somewhere on the homework
question it says, "list all the things all he says that these
three things apply to". He says, "hey, guess what, it applies to
everything I ever taught in the first turning of the wheel". I
went through fifty different way to understand your world. You
can divide it into five heaps. You can divide it into eighteen
categories. You can divide it into twelve doors of sense. You
can divide it into any way you want...six elements, doesn't
matter how you divide it. These three apply to every one. These
three apply to every one. So he's explaining the first turning
of the wheel also, okay. That's all. That's all. He says it
not only applies to one thing, it doesn't just apply to pens, it
applies to everything. Okay. And again I think it's very very
important to say that the goal of thinking about things in these
three categories is that you don't get old and die, okay. How do
you get old and die? 'Cause you don't understand that the pen is
not the pen from its own side. It's not what we call "pen" from
its own side. Okay. It's not "pen" naturally and neither are
all the people that you don't like. The people that you get
angry at, and the people that you try to hurt, and the people
that you collect bad karma about. They don't exist from their
own side. You're making them who they are. It's coming from
you. And the only thing you're accomplishing when you fight with
them is what? You're guaranteeing that they'll come back.
You're guaranteeing that you'll come back. Tantrically speaking,
every time you have a single thought of a single object as
existing from its own side, you have damaged your winds and your
body. You are one minute older. It's very interesting. It's
very interesting, okay? The thought of something as self
existent is killing you. Literally, okay. It's very
interesting. Every time you get upset at another person,
slightly, you have just hurt yourself a little more, you are
bringing yourself closer to death. You are causing certain
physical reactions in your body that are going to kill you. It's
very interesting. As the mind goes, the physical constituents
go. And and every time you think of something as self existent,
you are bringing yourself...you are killing yourself slowly. And
the accumulation of that is that you'll have to die. It's very
interesting. If you could change it and stop thinking of things
this way, you would not have to die. And that's the point of
Buddhism. The point of Buddhism is not to get calmer, or learn
to put up with your old age, or learn to put up with people you
don't like, or be friendly to everybody or something
nite...nothing to do with that. It is to accomplish "not dying"
and you can do it. Mahayana motivation goes a little bit
further. What? I'll learn how not to die so I can teach other
people. And you speak with more authority when you've done it
yourself. Okay. Yeah. You don't have to die. Prove it. Well,
I did it, (laughs) okay. (unclear) Show me. Okay. Here.
Here's how you do it, you know. That's all. That's Mahayana
motivation. Yeah?

(student: Is it...is it the (unclear) that causes you to age and
die or it is (unclear) neutral substance (unclear)

A neutral...he said, "does it have to be an active negative
thought like desire to anger or could it just be a a a neutral
misunderstanding of your universe?" A neutral misunderstanding
of your universe is enough to kill you because in this
school...in what school? In Middle Way School it's a mental
affliction. Okay. Just misunderstanding your world is killing
you. Even if you were friendly to everybody, it would still kill
you, okay. It's very interesting.

(student: When you speaking about not dying, what what how and
(laughter) (unclear))

(laughs) When I say not die I mean this. The continued
understanding of your universe, you know, to have continual
knowledge about your universe and to act appropriately out of
that knowledge actually changes the physical constituents of your
body so perfectly that it changes into a tantric deity, that's
all. You can achieve enlightenment in one lifetime.

(student: So then then that could that could (unclear))

Sorry?

(student: So that that could live on?)

Yeah. It...he said, "does it continue on?" Of course, yeah.
You don't, you can't go down from that state, you know, you can't
like start thinking of things as self existent again after that
because you have eliminated it. You have eliminated the seed for
it.

(student: There's also the concept about the manifestation of
the (unclear))

Of what?

(student: The manifestation of how things...the manifestation of
dying)

Oh, just because you see a tantric deity die doesn't mean that
they saw a tantric deity die, okay. Just because you see His
Holiness the Dalai Lama getting grey doesn't mean that the His
Holiness the Dalai Lama sees himself getting grey. Okay. That's
 why you haven't see anybody not die recently, 'cause it takes
almost as good karma to see it as to do it.

(student: Then what's the difference between visualizing a pink
elephant running in the room and a tantric deity (unclear)
(laughter)

He says, "what's the difference between visualizing a thirty foot
two headed pink elephant running through the room and visualizing
a tantric deity with twelve arms" or something like that, okay.
The the name for (kye rim) in (tantra), the name for (kye rim),
the name for the practice of doing those visualizations is called
(dakpay nelnjor). (Kun tak nelnjor). (Nelnjor) means "yoga".
(Kun tak) means? Imagining. and it is, and I can't go into
detail on it 'cause it's not appropriate in a public teaching,
but but the karma the karma of certain attitudes about them makes
them happen. Yeah.

(student: (unclear) My understanding was the way that you become
enlightened is by planting only virtuous kind of seeds so that
only virtuous karmic seeds ripen and you perceive yourself in
paradise. And what you stated a bit ago was that even ignorant
neutral karma seeds based on ignorance, which is a neutral karma,
would prevent you from becoming enlightened. You see what I
mean?)
Yeah, I think you gotta get...there's some schools like the lower
Middle Way School says that ignorance itself is not a mental
affliction. Okay. And then the Prasangika says that ignorance
itself is a mental affliction. See what I mean? And and just
misunderstanding your world is enough to kill you.

(student: That would be considered as collecting negative mental
karma?)

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It is a negative mental karma. The lower
schools, like when you read the Friday night reading, it won't
say that. Why? That's the Madyamika Svatantrika school. Okay.
The teaching on the Wheel of Life comes from there, okay. So you
gotta be careful on that. One more question and then we have to
stop. Or else I will project sleepiness (laughter).

(student: But based on the lower schools you can have a direct
perception of emptiness)

Can or can not?

(student: Can, right? You have to)

In...she said "in the lower schools can you have a direct
perception of emptioness"? Of course. Of course they say that,
even down to Vaibashika, even down to the Abhidharma schools.
But do they mean the same thing by emptiness? Not at all. Not
at all. Okay. Not at all.

(student: But then they must mean something different...)

That's what makes the schools different actually. That's one of
the biggest things that makes the school..

(student: How can you have a direct perception of something that
doesn't exist then?)

Oh, so she said, "how can you have a direct perception of
something that doesn't exist?" This is a very tricky subject. If
you ever see emptiness directly, even if you think you're an
Abhidharma person, you're automatically Madyamika Prasangika,
okay. You gotta get used to that.

(student: But up until that point you're Abhidharma)

You could think you're Abhidharma, (laughs) but you're not, okay
(laughter). All right. Now, would a person in the mind-set of
the person in the Abhidharma School would be likely to see
emptiness directly, not at all. You know You have to start
thinking Madyamika Prasangika thoughts before you can see
emptiness directly. You have to. Okay. You might not
understand that you're doing it, but you are, okay. Yeah.

(student: I thought we had a bodhisattva vow that we weren't
supposed)

Hum?

Oh oh oh. It's a question in (unclear). She said, "I thought we
had a Bodhisattva vow that said we not supposed to say that
Hiniyana people can't see emptiness directly." You do have a
bodhisattva vow that you're not supposed to say that Hinayana
people can't see emptiness directly (laughter) because Hinayana
people can see emptiness directly, but at that point, Hinayana
refers to their motivation, and not to their philosophical
school.

(student: Okay)

You have to be very clear on that. And Geshe Thubten Rinchen
covered that in the tapes, okay. All right. We'll do a prayer.
You ready Phuntsog-la?

(prayer: short mandala)

(prayer: dedication)
What the Buddha Really Meant