Углублённый курс ACI 04 — Искусство толкования, часть 1 (1998, Билакуппе, Индия), занятие 8

[Speaker 2]
Today, I would like to introduce you to a very interesting topic, which is related to Buddhism, which is called the Three Jewels of the Bodhisattva Way of Life. So, we finished our description of constructs.

[Speaker 1]
This morning, we talked about identifying what constructs were, and we were talking about them in terms of changing things. And although constructs in general and constructs, how they are treated at this point in the sutra, where the Buddha explains the antanimas, other sutras, are slightly different emphasis, right? They were emphasizing certain kinds of constructs this morning, as opposed to constructs in general.

But anyway, you get a general idea of what a construct is. And we defined constructs with regard to changing things, and then we can also define constructs with regard to unchanging things. This morning, we were both doing it with changing things.

But you've seen how all phenomena, whether it's changing things or other things, can be defined in terms of the three groups, or the three attributes, right? Meaning, kundaksera, wang, and nyongdru. What do you call it?

Constructs, changing things, and emptiness itself. So, you've seen how you can explain how those three groups apply or can be derived from any single one of those groups, right? And that's what we went through this morning.

So, we've been through that, and we're just about finished with the idea of a construct. We have to distinguish between the object of the word stick and the fact that it is the object of the word stick, okay? So, distinguish between the object of the word stick and this being the object of the word stick.

In Tibetan, there's a special grammar case called deni grammar case, which means, in English, we don't use it. We say, we elected so-and-so president. In Tibetan, you have to say, we elected so-and-so as president.

And that's called deni. It's a laden. It's a kind of a postposition in Tibetan grammar.

So, in this case, the implication of that particular postposition or grammar particle is that there's a distinction between the stick as the object that's called stick and the fact that the stick is called the stick, okay? And those are distinctions. So, now, don't forget that we're talking about the fact that the stick is the object called the stick, okay?

As opposed to the stick being the object of the name, okay? The fact, the stick, not talking about the object that the name stick, we're talking about the fact that the stick is the thing called the stick. That fact in itself, that condition in itself, is the thing called the stick, okay?

The fact that the thing is called a stick is going to be a sticking point later on, down below, when we get further on. This is going to be the subject of much discussion. And you have to make sure in your own mind that you understand what we're talking about when we say the fact that the stick is called a stick.

The fact that the stick is the thing called the stick. The fact that the stick is the thing called the stick. The fact that the stick is the thing which gets the name stick.

[Speaker 2]
Okay.

[Speaker 1]
So, now Je Tsongkapa, having gone... We've gone through a long explanation of what the sutra wherein the Buddha explains the meaning of his sutras, or the intention of his sutras. We've been dealing with this quotation, the whole conversation since this morning, was dealing with those three...

Remember they talked about three features? They started to talk about three features of that arena in which the mind which makes constructs acts, which is changing things. So, remember that the sutra was talking about that.

Now Je Tsongkapa, on the last line of page 22, is going to start analyzing that sutra quotation for us. He's going to start tearing apart the wording of that sutra quotation for us. We've finished talking about the meaning of it.

Now we're going to see Je Tsongkapa's take on it in his own words. He's finished up to the end of the last line of page 22. In the middle there, he has completed the sutra quotation.

And now from the end of line 22, he's going to begin to start tearing it down. And the first thing he says is, the first three terms, he says, are referring to the object which the conceptualizing or construction state of mind makes its construction. The first three terms there are talking about the arena, or the basis on which the constructing state of mind makes its construct with regard to changing things.

And those three terms are, if you remember, it is the arena in which the constructing state of mind acts. It is that thing which has the characteristics of being labeled, both in words and in thoughts. And then thirdly, it has the quality of coming from its causes and conditions.

Those were the three terms. First of all, those three terms refer to what the constructing or constructions are directed towards, which is changing things. Then he draws a line and he says, now from there on, from that point on in the sutra, Lord Buddha is explaining how it is that the mind applies labels, whether they are verbal or mental, onto these things.

So, first we talk about how changing things are the object of the imagining or the labeling process, construction process. And then after that he's going to talk about how it actually works, how the process of labeling, both mentally and verbally, actually functions.

[Speaker 2]
That's it.

[Speaker 1]
That's it. We talked about all the crucial points here this morning. We covered in great detail and definitively we've covered all the important points here.

I just want to tie it together for you and relate everything to the actual wording of the sutra. So, the ideas we've already covered, now I just want to make sure, and Je Tsongkapa wants to make sure, that you get the wording of the sutra all worked out to fit what we talked about this morning. So, then Je Tsongkapa goes on page 23, line 2.

He has promised to give you the way in which the labeling, he's promised to describe the way in which the labeling process works, both through words and thoughts. And so now he's got down to, remember we took the backscratcher stick and we took the boy named Tashi. But Buddha is going to take form, or what we call physical matter.

So, in this case, now the word sukha is being used in the sense of the skandha, or the part of a person called sukha, meaning physical matter. So, the Buddha is taking physical matter and then he is examining it to see how we draw constructs from both the main object and from the characteristics of the object, remember? So, from the object as a whole, or from the object, the main nature of the object, and then how do we draw constructs, or how do we create constructs based on the characteristics of the whole.

And then in Tibetan we use two different words here. Kepa, which is a tricky word, which here means the particulars of the object. And then he's going to discuss the kepa, which means the features of the object.

So, he's using particulars and features as almost synonymous here. So, he's using, Je Tsongkapa is saying, we're going to discuss the particulars, meaning the features, how those act as a basis for the constructing state of mind. And then Je Tsongkapa promises to discuss it in detail.

He says, shiptu, he means, I'm going to discuss this in great detail. And Geshe-la says, it's very important that he says that, because this is one of the most important points of all the Mind-Only School's beliefs. So, Je Tsongkapa is promising us that he will cover it.

Shiptu means in great detail, because he believes and he understands that this is a very important part for us to concentrate on. We've talked about constructs in great detail this morning. Case is closed.

Je Tsongkapa is later going to go into this in detail, but right now, case is closed. You can shut that. In Tibetan they say you can push it up now, meaning case is closed right now.

So, now we're going on to how to identify or how to describe or how to characterize that category, that group called changing things, shenwang, right? So, now we've gone on to that one. We're putting away constructs for a while, and now we're moving on to changing things, or shenwang.

And then Geshe-la says, you know, shenwang is not such a problem. By comparison, shenwang is a lot easier. This is a no-brainer.

So, he goes on and he starts quoting that sutra again, the sutra in which the Buddha explains his sutras. And he says, shenwang, changing things, has these three same characteristics, these three same features that we talked about before. First of all, it is the arena in which the constructing state of mind is doing its thing, it's functioning.

Secondly, it does have a quality of being labeled in different ways, both by words and by your mind. And then thirdly, it has a quality or a condition of being something which grows from its causes and conditions. So, now we're treating changing things, shenwangs, not with regard to being the focus or the locus of the arena.

We're not talking about them in terms of how they act as what the constructing state of mind, or kundaks, refer to or apply to. Because we're not explaining kundaks anymore. We're not talking anymore about constructs.

Now we're treating shenwangs on their own. Not so much as having a relationship to constructs, but from their own side, as shenwangs, as changing things. They also exhibit the same three qualities that we talked about, the same three features that we talked about when we were talking about them as relating to constructs.

So, now they're like, shenwangs get to stand on their own and have the same three qualities, but not so much emphasis on, with relation to constructs. So, now the sutra is talking about these three features as they relate to changing things on their own, standing on their own. This is easy to see how these three features, again, apply to changing things.

It's pretty much, we've covered it already, so I'm not going to go into much detail on it. It's not a big thing.

[Speaker 2]
Listen.

[Speaker 1]
Now he's going to...Jesu Kapa quotes the sutra, right? He quotes Je Tsongkhap, the sutra goes into those three features with regard to changing things. And now the sutra runs out on page, I'm sorry, on line 8, right in the middle of line 8, page 23.

There's the end of the sutra quotation. The sutra quotation was only two and a half lines, right? And all it said was, changing things are the arena of the constructs.

Changing things have the characteristic of being something like the thing labeled. And changing things have a quality of being produced or having to do with production of things. So then Je Tsongkhapa says, look, that's all the sutra says about them, it's easy.

And now I'll give you a short description of what those three features refer to when they're talking about changing things. And that short description starts on line 8, in the middle where it says, dang bu, okay? And what it means is, the first one, meaning the first of the three features with regard to changing things alone and not so much emphasizing the relationship to constructs, the first one refers to the fact that it's demonstrating, says Je Tsongkhapa, whose object they are, who it is that's focusing upon them.

Who is that? The constructing state of mind, right? And then secondly, the second term is describing how they are the thing which receives the label of the constructing state of mind.

And the third one is simply indicating their basic nature. What is their basic nature? They are products of their causes and conditions.

So that completes Je Tsongkhapa's take on what those three features mean with regard to changing things.

[Speaker 2]
Anything else? Nothing.

[Speaker 1]
Changing things is a short story. Finish. Close the case.

Nothing more to say much about it. Let's go on.

[Speaker 2]
Hm. Hm. Hm.

Hm. Hm. Hm.

Hm. Hm. Hm.

Hm. Hm. Hm.

Hm. Hm. Hm.

Hm. Mm.

[Speaker 1]
Hm.

[Speaker 2]
Hm. Hm. Mm.

[Speaker 1]
Given that you understand constructs so well, that now that we move on to the third group, which is totality or the emptiness of things, it's just a breeze for you now, because you realize that it's just defined in terms of what's denied when we speak of emptiness. So since you know that so well now, it's just a breeze. Line 6, up from the bottom, page 23, they start quoting the sutra on how those three features refer to things which are emptiness itself, emptiness itself.

So here we go. nambar chokpa chu yuk, gunda gyi tse ni de ne, duje gyi tse ma de nyi The trick here is the expression de nyi, meaning the thusness, or that very. And that very is a word for emptiness.

So that very-ness, that very thing, which involves, again, the same three characteristics, which is tied up into those things which are the object of constructs, those things which display the characteristics of labeling, those things which have to do with the process of production. But the de nyi means the very nature of those things. So now that he's added ness to all those three features, that is the ultimate nature of, that is totality or emptiness with regard to things which are labeled or things which are the objects of constructs.

And when we talk about their nature or their very nature, now he's using the word very nature, ngo nyi, the impossibility, the very impossibility of their nature, meaning their emptiness. Here the wording is the very impossibility of their nature, the very fact or the impossibility of their self-nature, he says. That is, that very nature, now we're on the second line from the bottom, page 23, is the object on which total purity rests.

Now you know from the other day that total purity refers to the path of total purity, meaning a code word for the direct perception of emptiness. So that thing which you can describe in all those ways, says the sutra, that's the thing which is the attribute called totality, meaning emptiness. So that's the sutra's presentation of how we describe totality or emptiness, the third group or the third attribute in the Maitreya school.

[Speaker 2]
Now we have a little more subtle, now remember from this morning, take those three things, and we got the stick over here, we got the kundaka here, but now it's going to be a little bit different.

[Speaker 1]
So here you got the stick, and now we're talking about a new idea, the fact that the stick is the thing called the stick, which is a kundaka in itself, which is a construct in itself. The fact that the stick is the thing that's called the stick, the fact that that fact doesn't come of its own accord, doesn't exist by definition, is another way of stating the stick's yongdrum, the emptiness of the stick. I'll say it again.

Here you got the stick, here you got the fact that the stick is what we call the stick, and the fact that the fact that the stick is what we call the stick is not in itself something that exists by definition, is the emptiness or is the yongdrum in this case, is the totality. One more time. Here's the stick.

The fact that the stick is called the stick itself is not a fact that exists by definition, and that fact is the emptiness in this case, is the totality or the emptiness in this case. That's how we describe that third attribute in the Minority School. One more time.

Take the fact that the stick is what we call the stick, okay? If that existed, take that fact as something which, as if it did exist by definition, okay? If that fact, that fact viewed as if it was something that did exist by definition, is the gaccha in this case.

It is what we deny, okay? It is what emptiness is NPS. Okay, I'll do it one more time.

The fact that the fact that the stick is what is called the stick, if that fact existed by definition, you know, viewed from the point of view as if it did exist by definition, that's an impossible thing, right? But if it did exist by definition, if there were such a thing, that's what we are denying. We are denying that possibility.

And when we successfully deny that gaccha, a fact that the pen is what we call the pen that existed by definition, which is impossible, right? Once we cancel that, once we disprove that, once we show that that's impossible, then we arrive at emptiness. That's yongdu.

Okay, that's what we call totality. We arrive at emptiness through that process by denying the fact that the fact that the pen is what we call the pen could exist by definition. When we deny that, we arrive at totality or emptiness as it's taught in the Mahayana school.

That's the real case. It really doesn't, yeah, it doesn't exist by definition. Yeah, yeah, you can just go.

That is what we call the lack of a self to objects, okay? And in the mind-only school, Chilton's right, I left out that last piece there. In the mind-only school, this is the lack of a self to objects, which is the ultimate, the highest form of emptiness to them, okay?

This is the highest form of emptiness, the lack of self-existence to objects. Remember that in this case, objects refers to the parts of a person as opposed to the person, which in this school is a higher, or it's the ultimate form of emptiness, okay? The emptiness of objects.

What is that? It's the fact that the fact that the pen is what we call the pen, is the thing that's called the pen, doesn't exist by definition, okay? Or if you want to state it even better, the fact that the pen is what we call the pen which could exist by definition, doesn't exist, is the object.

And if there were such a fact, that would be the ultimate self-nature, self-existent thing, and the cancelling of that is emptiness, ultimate emptiness. He thinks that you were talking about something you weren't talking about, but it's still interesting, okay? So he says, probably he's thinking in his mind, why are we just talking about the lack of self-nature to things, and we haven't mentioned the lack of self-nature of a person, because lack of self-nature is always divided into two kinds, the lack of self-nature to Winston, and the lack of self-nature of Winston's parts, which is called the lack of self-nature of things, or the lack of self-nature of objects. So when you think about the construct, if you take this morning's class, when you think about the construct that we said didn't exist, right?

The construct, the idea that the construct existed by definition, that was the construct that didn't exist. Or if you take the example we just gave of something, the fact that the pen is what we call the pen, the fact that that fact doesn't have any nature of existing by definition, that if there were a fact like that that could exist by definition, that that would be a self-nature of things, and the lack of that, or the general absence of that, is no self-nature of things. So really, that's one kind of gaccha, right?

That's one kind of thing that we deny. What? The fact that the pen is what you call the pen, exists by definition.

And a fact that the pen is called the pen that did exist by definition, which is impossible, right? That would be one kind of gaccha. That would be one kind of thing that emptiness is empty of.

And once you cancel that kind of self-nature, you arrive at what we call the self-nature of things. Now, what is it that you cancel to arrive at the self-nature of a person? You see?

Because that would be a different gaccha. That's a slightly different gaccha. And then he's quick to point out that it's hard to draw distinctions between the two gacchas because neither one of them exists, right?

They're both just theoretical things that don't really exist, okay? But he says there are two schools of thought about the second gaccha, or the second thing that emptiness denies. That when we talk about the emptiness of a person, like the emptiness of Winston, for example, then there's a certain kind of gaccha, okay?

There's a certain kind of self-existing person that we're thinking of. And then when you cancel that self-existence or you prove the general lack of that self-existence, you arrive at the emptiness of the person, right? And there are two schools of thought, says Geshe-la.

Some people say that that is a kind of yong dum. Some people describe that as, oh, that's yong dum, that's totality. That is emptiness in the middle way school.

I'm sorry, in the mind-only school. But then there are other people who say, that's just a kind of totality. You can call that a kind of totality, but they're kind of implying that it's not a kind of yong dum, okay?

So there's some people who say that the lack, the general lack of a, to put it simply, a self-existent self, is only a kind of yong dum, but not really yong dum. It's just that yong dum which is lack of something, of a self-existing person. And they describe it that way.

Some people just go straight for yong dum and say, yeah, that's a yong dum. So there are two schools of thought about that one, about that kind of lack of self-existence.

[Speaker 2]
So there are two schools of thought about that kind of lack of self-existence.

[Speaker 1]
Either way, there are different schools of thought. Some very great Buddhist philosophers have said that the general lack of a self-nature to the person, of a person, is itself yong dum itself, is totality, is emptiness, is the third group of emptiness. And other great scholars have come along and said, no, that's not, that's just a kind of totality which is represented by the lack of a self-existent person, but implying that it's not real totality.

It's not really the emptiness that's described by the Mainoli school. And he says, obviously, but everybody agrees that there's got to, some kind of distinctions have to be made here. Because you do have a lack of self-nature to things, or parts of a person, and then you have a lack of self-nature of a person.

And the opposite of a self-existing person can be discussed as being yong dum, or totality, or emptiness in the Mainoli school, or it can be described as just something that you'd call yong dum, or emptiness in the terms of the Mainoli school. So, everybody agrees that there's some kind of distinction to be made here. Now, whether you go side with one side, or whether you side with the other side, still there's going to be a discussion coming later in this very book that talks about the lack, what you get after you cancel a self-existent person.

What kind of emptiness do you get out of that? And interestingly enough, that's going to come in our discussion later of the first turning of the wheel. Remember, we've been bogged down here, we've been tied up here in the second turning of the wheel.

Everything we've said for a while has been with regard to the second turning of the wheel. Later on, we're going to start talking about the first turning of the wheel, and this same question is going to come back to haunt us later. So we'll treat it then.

This morning we were discussing a kind of construct that didn't exist, weren't we? We were describing a kind of construct that didn't exist. And we have a name that we're going to call it.

And then Geshe-la says, he pauses and he says, you know, it's kind of hard to name things that don't exist meaningfully, you know. Meaningfully, how do you name a thing that doesn't exist? But, you know, in terms of talking about it, in terms of having to discuss it, we will call it the self-nature of objects, or the self-nature of the parts of a person.

A quote, I think in English you have to say, a quote self-nature, it's like the purple elephant, right? You have to say, I think in English you have to say, a so-called self-nature of objects. Of objects, meaning, when we say objects here, it's a code word for parts of a person as opposed to the person.

[Speaker 2]
That's a good one.

[Speaker 1]
Same thing.

[Speaker 2]
We'll get there. Yes. Nothing, nothing.

Nothing.

[Speaker 1]
Yesterday, Lofan Chunson asked me about, you know, to help translate it into English. Well, how do we translate YONG DU? YONG DU, that third group, or that third attribute.

How do we do it? I'm going to talk about it. And then I opened the door to Madhyamika, we went in there, and I explained it in terms of the minute a thing exists, DU, then everything about it, YONG, is empty.

Like all the parts of it, everything about it, the thing itself. As soon as it exists, everything about it is empty. DU, YONG, YONG DU.

But then he says, you know, there's another way you can describe it, and that's if you take the word DU as referring to all existing objects. So if you draw a big line around every existing object in the world, which is called DU, DU also means to exist. So if you draw a huge line around every existing object in the world, then atop each object, laying upon each object, in their totality, YONG, is emptiness.

So the whole totality of every object in the world, each member of that totality has its own emptiness, and in that sense, total existence. You see? Upon every existing group object, in totality, YONG, has emptiness.

Emptiness applies to every single object there, totally, in totality. So that's another way of describing YONG DU, as a word, and not in the meaning. I mean, that has some meaning, but the main point is, if you're trying to struggle in English with the words YONG and DU, this is helpful.

Don't forget that when I give an etymological explanation of a word, we are not talking necessarily that the result of that etymological explanation will be a term which is totally correct, or totally accurate, or totally inclusive. If you do that with etymological explanations, you might get into trouble later with some of them. So they are descriptive, and not comprehensive.

So just to review, just to review where we are. Don't forget that this is how we describe YONG DU, or what are we going to call it now? Let's stick to totality.

What were we calling it before? Totality? What was the other one?

Let's say totality. Let's stick with totality. Okay, so if you take totality, what is it again with reference to a water pitcher?

How do you describe it with reference to a water pitcher? We are discussing the fact that the water pitcher is the object, or the thing, which is named water pitcher. The fact that the water pitcher is the thing that's named water pitcher, the fact that that fact itself doesn't exist by definition, is the YONG DU of the water pitcher.

It is the emptiness of the water pitcher. That's what we call the totality of the water pitcher. And so, cancelling any fact that the pitcher is what we call the water pitcher that could have existed by definition is how we arrive at the emptiness, or the YONG DU, or the totality of the water pitcher.

You guys got all that right. You guys got all that straight. Now, somebody's going to come along and cause a problem with that.

Somebody's going to come along and have a misconception about it. The omniscient Jonama. Jonama.

He's back again. He's back again, and he's got a problem with that. He's got a problem with that way of explaining it.

He's got a problem with Jatakapa saying that that's how the sutra is explaining it. Jatakapa is addressing a contradiction that Jonama's beliefs incur. Jonama has expressed the belief that YONG DU, or emptiness in the idea of the mind-only school, is the absence of the other two.

Anything which is devoid of constructs, or anything which is devoid of being a changing thing, that's what YONG DU is. YONG DU is not the absence of a self-existent thing. YONG DU is the absence of the other two groups.

And that's how he defines YONG DU. That's how he defines emptiness. And that's how he says the mind-only school defines emptiness.

And then Jatakapa comes up to him and says, I don't quite remember, did you say that this sutra in which the Buddha explained what he really meant in his sutras, did you say that was something you were supposed to take figurative or literally? And then Jonama says, well, I said it was literal, right? Because he's almost like a mind-only himself, right?

And he says, you have to take it literally. And then Jatakapa says, well, then you contradict the text directly, because the text doesn't say that at all. The text describes YONG DU, or emptiness, exactly the way I just described it.

Nowhere in the text does it describe it. It describes it as the lack of a self-existent construct applying to changing things. It doesn't describe it as a lack of those two categories being YONG DU.

Got it? The text says, the sutra, what the sutra is really saying is that a self-existent construct doesn't apply to changing things. Whereas you're taking it, voidness or emptiness, to be the simple lack in things, or simply something that is a voidness or a general lack of the other two groups, and you describe emptiness that way, you contradict the sutra, which you say has to be taken literally, yourself, directly.

YONG DU means emptiness. The scriptural quotation, and it's going to be a little more clear now from what I understand, but it's difficult. The scriptural backup for this is on page 23, the third line from the bottom.

And Jetsam Kapha says, look, that line there is saying that emptiness, that YONG DU, emptiness, in the Mind-Only School, is simply the lack, it's the fact that changing things do not have a nature of having constructs which apply to them, which exist by definition, right? That's what it means. But Jonama is saying that the fact that emptiness doesn't have a nature of being a changing thing, nor a construct, that's his idea of what emptiness is.

And Jetsam Kapha says, if you say it that way, you contradict the sutra at this point, where the sutra itself says that YONG DU, or emptiness, is defined as the general lack among changing things of any nature of being a construct which comes from its own, which exists by definition. And it's not that emptiness is described by the Buddha as being the general lack of a quality of being a changing thing, or lack of being a construct applied to emptiness. The fact that emptiness is not a changing thing, or the fact that emptiness is not a construct, is not the point of what emptiness means.

That's not its emptiness. That's not what emptiness is. That's not what the text says.

And you contradict this very quotation, line 23, third line from the bottom. YANG RGYAS DU GSOS NA NGA'ANG BDE BA'I DU KUN KHYEN BYONG DRA BA'ANG GI LUS SU LA YONG DUG GI GAR YIN SRED NA YONG DUG GI BSTAN DU CHEN WANG DANG KUN DAG MA GRUB PA DE Yeah, I got it right. So that was the viewpoint.

It's the general absence, the fact that emptiness is not a changing thing or a construct, is its emptiness. That's what emptiness is. That's his idea, and it's wrong.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you.

[Speaker 1]
Mejoo Kundatin, may we do YONG DU? And Geshe-la repeats that, what the sutra is really saying is that changing things, the lack, the fact that changing things don't possess any nature of having constructs, the constructs that don't exist, right? A construct that could exist by definition.

The fact that that kind of construct could never apply to changing things is YONG DU, is emptiness, and that's what the sutra is really saying. So Janawa got it wrong.

[Speaker 2]
Why?

[Speaker 1]
He said, You described it correctly this morning, you described correctly this morning, you got into it this morning, You got into it this morning. You all were very close to the same thing. Meaning what?

The fact that dasi, the fact that dasi is the thing that we call dasi, the fact that the fact that the thing that we call, the fact that the fact that dasi is the thing we call dasi, but that that doesn't exist by definition, and that dasi is not that. I'll do it again. The fact that the fact that dasi is what we call the name dasi, doesn't exist by definition, is the yong drup of dasi, is the emptiness of dasi.

You guys got it. You guys got it this morning. You got it.

You got it. You expressed it. You expressed it.

Everybody got it. And that is what the sutra is saying. That is what the sutra is talking about.

Now here comes Je Tsongkapa. He's saying that he accepts the wording of the sutra literally, and then he goes on to say that that's not what the sutra meant, that the sutra meant something else, that yong drup or emptiness is the fact that emptiness is not a changing thing, and it's not a construct, and that that's what emptiness is. That's a complete internal direct contradiction.

On one hand he says he believes the sutra literally, and on the other hand he's explaining it in a way that the sutra never states, and that that's a direct contradiction. We better go over the wording a little bit. It's almost like we don't have any choice but to go over the wording a bit, do we?

[Speaker 2]
XIANG WANG GUNG DHA

[Speaker 1]
BAMBU DE XIANG WANG GUNG DHA CHE

[Speaker 2]
GUNG DHA

[Speaker 1]
NI BU DE NI BU DE LAI CHA

[Speaker 2]
XIANG WANG GUNG DHA GUNG DHA GUNG YI GYI DONG PA YI NGON GYI GUNG YI NGON GYI NI GUNG ME YI XIA BA NI DE XIA BA GUNG ME YI NGON GYI NI GUNG YI NGON GYI

[Speaker 1]
NI BU DE GUNG DHA GENG NYID KYI EN PA The Yong De Beo XIANG WANG GUNG DHA DEN NYID GYI DONG PA GUNG DHA GENG NYID GYI DONG PA DEN NYID GYI DONG PA

[Speaker 2]
XIANG WANG GUNG DHA DEN NYID GYI DONG PA DEN NYID GYI DONG MA DEN YID GYI DONG PA

[Speaker 1]
XIANG WANG GUNG THA DEN YID GYI DONG PA Where's the two words from? to help Dronago understand the sutra, right?

And he says, you know, the sutra says, Itself, twice. Daini means itself, or it's very self, or it's dustness, or something like that. In itself, or itself, is the word daini.

And Je Tsongkhapa is trying to help Dronago understand it more clearly, and he says, now listen, the Buddha said, Itself, twice. When he said, and by the way, in Tibetan, itself is also like, almost exclusive, meaning only itself, okay? There are those two flavors of the word daini in Tibetan.

So he says, don't forget that the sutra said, Itself, twice. The first time the sutra says, Itself, they're talking about dependent things, things which are caused. And then the second time it's talking about Itself, they're talking about constructs with specific regard to the constructs which don't have any existence, okay?

So, and the whole thing comes out then, in English, right? Changing things themselves, meaning, restrict yourself to this group, changing things themselves, do not, the fact that they do not possess constructs that don't exist themselves, is the yongdru, is the emptiness of those changing things. Okay, I'll say it one more time.

The way the sutra uses the word themselves, Je Tsongkapa is trying to explain it to Jonawa. Changing things themselves, meaning as a group, do not possess any nature of having applied to them constructs of kinds that don't exist themselves, and the general lack of those kinds of constructs themselves on changing things themselves is what the emptiness of those changing things is, the yongdru, the totality of those changing things is. It doesn't cover things.

You, Jonawa, have to understand what those two denis mean. First, we're referring to Shenlongs. Second, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist.

[Speaker 2]
First, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Second, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Third, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist.

Fourth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Fifth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Sixth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist.

Seventh, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Eighth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Ninth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist.

Tenth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Twelfth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Twelfth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist.

Fifth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist. Sixth, we're referring to the constructs we don't exist.

[Speaker 1]
How do you say, I don't exist. In the Dhamma, we say, I don't exist.

[Speaker 2]
In the Dhamma, we say, I don't exist. I've told you so many times. We've talked about it.

I don't exist. Oh, ni-te.

[Speaker 1]
Ni-te. Oh, ni.

[Speaker 2]
Ni-te. Oh, ni. Oh, ni.

Oh, ni ma-chi-pa. That's all. That's all.

Ni-te. That's all.

[Speaker 1]
That's all. If you want to go back to the sutra and find those two denis, right? To actually, you know, we'll lock onto them and you can underline them and say, oh, well, here's the denis that he's talking about.

Go to page twenty-three. Fifth line from the bottom. Very last syllable on the fifth line is DE, and then the first syllable on the sixth line is NYI.

That's the first DENG NYIS. Then you go looking for the second DENG NYIS, it's the DE KHO NA in the third line from the bottom of page twenty-three, which is a synonym in Tibetan for DENG NYIS. So, those are the two DENG NYIS.

The one is not spelled like that, but it's totally the same meaning. Okay? Better make a little mark on those DENG NYIS, okay?

Because later on there might be a hassle come up about those little DENG NYIS, if we have time. We'll see if we have time, but we might come back and revisit those two DENG NYIS and discuss an issue that comes up with those DENG NYIS.

[Speaker 2]
Okay. Okay.

[Speaker 1]
I've got a question for you guys. The next section is called, How Things Are Empty. What does it mean to be empty?

What does it mean to be empty of something? And he says, now, think about normal everyday world, normal everyday speech, and people go around and they would describe this room, for example, as being empty. Nobody's in the room.

You open the door, you look in and you say, the room is empty. That's one way of thinking about the expression empty. But then you have a little bit different flavor, don't you?

If you say, look at a rope that someone has mistaken for a snake, right? Like, it's dusk and it's a little bit dark and somebody's mistaken this rope for a snake. And then suddenly they realize it's not a snake at all, it's just a rope.

They are perceiving that this rope is devoid of any nature of being a real snake, right? It is empty of having any nature of being a real snake. It is devoid.

So, in Tibetan the word is the same. The room is empty and then that piece of rope is empty of having any nature of being a real snake, or devoid of being a snake. So, you have voidness or emptiness.

When you think about it, what do you guys think? Generally speaking, if you really think about it carefully, emptiness, they are both the same sort of idea, right? It's the absence of something.

So, generally speaking, it's about the same thing when you say the room is empty and when you say the piece of rope is empty of being a real snake, or devoid of any nature of being a real snake. So, very generally they both mean some kind of absence or lack of something. But in your opinions, now I'm asking you a question, everybody.

In your opinions, in everyday speech, in the everyday meaning of the word emptiness, are those two the same? Are they exactly the same? Or do they have a slightly different flavor or connotation?

When somebody says the room is empty, what do they think about when they say the room is empty? Mi yu na, dokpay yu na, gup kyang yu na, digyi tongpa re.

[Speaker 2]
Nan. Nan. Nan.

[Speaker 1]
Nan. So, when you come in and say the room is empty, the question is whether or not there are people in that room, whether or not there is furniture in that room. It's not a question of whether the guy is a guy or the furniture is a furniture, right?

Again, ladies. Now, when you say a piece of rope is devoid of having any nature of being a real snake, what do you mean then? What do you have in mind then?

[Speaker 2]
If it were a real snake, it would be a real snake, and it would make a piece out of it as a real snake. How is it? Instead of what it is, it's a real snake.

You say can you see...

[Speaker 1]
If it were a real snake, it's not a real snake. The concept of a real snake is that it's a pure snake, and you see that it's a pure snake. That's the concept.

[Speaker 2]
And if it was a real snake, it would be a real snake.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, he agrees with you, and he likes the way you said it, and he says, yeah, the case with the piece of rope is that you're looking at the piece of rope and trying to decide in your mind, is it a snake? Isn't it a snake? Could it be a snake?

Was it a snake? You know, like, is it going to bite me or not? It's something like a conversation going on in your mind.

You're trying to decide something intellectual about the piece of rope. He said, I kind of like that part. What was your question?

I forgot. A statement.

[Speaker 2]
Well, you're not trying to determine whether or not something is present or not. You're trying to determine the nature of where it is.

[Speaker 1]
Okay. Do you agree? What are you thinking about?

Are you all in agreement that that's the main point?

[Speaker 2]
The piece of rope never was a snake, and it could be. That's the statement.

[Speaker 1]
Dönme ne, söme ne. korang gi rangshin de, druk gi empa di re-su. che ta di chikdi lo purwa re-su.

chikdi rangshin gi suru nam dak te. What do you think? Philosophically, you're correct.

But remember I phrased this question in terms of what do guys say in their normal everyday world? And they don't come in and say, well, you know, there's a word in Tibetan which is adventitious, you see, I mean some kind of philosophical word. The absence or presence of a chair is something we call adventitious in philosophy, meaning it was like that and then it changed into something else.

But this is what we call ontologically, you know, it never was a snake and couldn't have been a snake and never will be a snake. And he says, oh yeah, yeah, we don't have to use that kind of language here. We're just guys, we're just walking in the room.

And I kind of like the way they said it. And he said, don't forget that I phrased my question in the way that normal people would think of the difference between those two things. And really it is a question, you know, you can say it in Tibetan the way I said it to him as well.

One is a question of yu me, one is a question of nin nin. In Tibetan the word is or to be has two flavors. One is the presence or absence, one is the identity.

Is it or is it not that thing, you see what I mean? And he likes Chilton's way of expressing it.

[Speaker 2]
Yes, sir?

[Speaker 1]
Yes, sir? When we say that dependent objects, meaning changing things, are devoid of any nature of construct of the type that doesn't exist, right? The construct that is existing by definition, right?

When we say that changing things like the boar dashi is devoid or absent of those things, we are, of course, referring to the second kind of emptiness. The way we use emptiness with regard to the piece of rope and the snake. The rope is devoid or doesn't have any nature of being a real snake.

And we are not using the word empty in the sense that we use it in the sense of in the world when we say the room is empty. So we're really talking about in terms of identity that the thing is devoid of having that nature rather than in the way that in the everyday world we use the word empty to describe a room. And now we get...

This is this pattern of Geshe-la giving you the meaning of it with an easy to understand example and then taking you back to Je Tsongkapa's wording and saying, that's what he's trying to say here, okay? So, now you get back to the wording, third line from the bottom on page 24, and Je Tsongkapa says, now, how is it that things are empty? It's not emptiness in the sense of a water pitcher being here or not being here in front of us, okay?

That's not what we mean by the word emptiness in this case. What we're referring to here, says Je Tsongkapa, is the emptiness of, what should we say, the fact that a person doesn't have any what we call material existence. Now, we didn't get to that point yet, we didn't discuss that thing yet, what it means to have material existence.

In Tibetan, it's zey ye, okay? To exist, to have any... Let's start with...

we'll call it material existence right now, okay? That's the kind of identity emptiness. And Geshe-la says, for now, think of it as the fact that changing things do not have any nature of the constructs which didn't exist, okay?

Their lack of having any constructs applied to them of the kind that don't exist is their emptiness. And that's a different kind of emptiness than the one that's described by saying, oh, there's no water pitcher here on the floor in front of us, okay? That would be the equivalent of what Geshe-la was speaking about when he talked about the room being empty.

And then when you talk about the person not having any material existence, or you talk about changing things not being such that the constructs of the kind that don't exist don't apply to them, that's referring to Geshe-la's example about the piece of rope and the snake, that that piece of rope is devoid of having any nature of being a real snake. So there are the correlations there.

[Speaker 2]
Yes, yes.

[Speaker 1]
Now on page twenty-five, we've reached page twenty-five, the second line, and this is where Desangkapa says... well, actually where the citrus says... who is it?

No, it's Desangkapa. This is where he says, when we talk about emptiness, in terms of it being changing things not possessing, constructs that apply to them of the kind that don't exist, that exist by definition, that's the kind of constructs we're talking about, the ones that refer to changing things, and the ones that don't exist. Those are the kind of constructs we're talking about, and we're not going to be talking about, and the sutra does not emphasize the other kinds of constructs, such as empty space, or archetypes, or things like that.

It's not talking about that kind. Again, Geshe-la reminds you, remember we skipped ahead to this section earlier this morning, and this was the section where Desangkapa says, look, the sutra is not emphasizing, laying any emphasis, not making any great mention of those other kinds of constructs. It is emphasizing or talking about the kind of constructs with regard to changing things that don't exist or do exist, but it's talking about constructs with regard to changing things, because it's through examining those constructs that you can come easily to an understanding of emptiness, because emptiness means the fact that changing things are devoid of certain kinds of those constructs.

I can add one more thing here while there's a pause. When he said that these are the kind of constructs that we're talking about, the constructs involving the very nature of things and the constructs involving the features of things, he mentioned that also. By the way, please have your tapes ready, like ready to pull out.

Je Tsongkapa, on page 25, on line 3, mentions at the two points in the text, at the two points in the text, it's called GNYIS GAR. And then Geshe-la, being the thorough person he is, says, I want to find these two points in the text. Well, one of them is back on page 9, the third line from the bottom, where it says, ,DE LA CHUD NAM GYI TSE NI NGO NI MED PA GNYIS GANG ZHES NA, ,KUN THAG PA'I TSE NI GANG YIN PA'O, That's the first occasion that they're talking about.

The second occasion that Je Tsongkapa is referring to appears on page 22. It's introduced seven lines from the top, where it says, ,GSUM PA NI RIGS NUMBER THREE, and then he says, ,YOU MAY WONDER YOURSELF, BLAH BLAH BLAH, what this is all talking about. And then he goes into a quotation from the sutra.

That is the second occasion. So those are the two occasions mentioned in page 25, line 3, where Je Tsongkapa talks about two occasions.

[Speaker 2]
Line 3.

[Speaker 1]
Yes, sir. Then again they mention here constructs... What is he saying?

Constructs which are the result of constructing constructs that relate to the nature of the general thing, and then constructing constructs that relate to the characteristics of the thing. Constructing constructs of the nature and constructing constructs of the features of the object. We're talking about those two kinds of constructs.

Constructs constructed about the nature or the main thing, the object, and then constructs constructed about the features of the thing as opposed to the main thing. Those are the two kinds of constructs we're going to be talking about, and not the other ones like empty space or archetypes or things like that. Remember that Je Tsongkapa said, I'll explain why we only deal with these kinds of constructs later on.

And don't forget that this morning we jumped way ahead, and Je Tsongkapa explained why those constructs were more useful to work with than the other general constructs, and that was because it helped us to understand yongdrup or emptiness, right? You remember I went to page 85 this morning and helped you out with that, and that was the backup, or that was where Je Tsongkapa explained again, starting from the seventh line on page 85. And in that quotation again, it says, why is it that in the...

Generally speaking, it's true that there are a lot of different constructs in the world, says Je Tsongkapa, including archetypes, and including empty space itself, etc. But why does the sutra not refer to these more general kinds of constructs? Well, because it's not a necessary accoutrement in understanding, right?

In understanding what it is that makes emptiness empty. What it is that emptiness is empty of, which is those constructs which exist by definition, or those constructs that relate to those particular changing objects. So those are the constructs we have to talk about.

That's why the sutra talks about those constructs, and doesn't talk about those other more general constructs. It's talking about constructs with regard to changing things, because it's the absence of those that helps us understand emptiness as emptiness relates to changing things. I told you about all that this morning.

[Speaker 2]
Mm. Mm. Mm.

[Speaker 1]
Mm.

[Speaker 2]
Mm. Mm. Mm.

Mm. Mm.

[Speaker 1]
Mm.

[Speaker 2]
Mm. Mm. Mm.

Mm.

[Speaker 1]
I talked this morning all about this guy named Tashi, this boy named Tashi. Tashi was going. Tashi went.

We got Tashi. We got Tashi down. We got Tashi down.

So now that you got Tashi down, you understand how those three attributes of the mind-only school apply to the first example he gave. We were giving Tashi as an example. The scripture is giving physical matter.

Now he's changing, by the way, from visual matter, which is one interpretation of sukha, to the first of the five heaves, which is your physical body, or physical matter in general, okay? So now, having understood how those three attributes apply to a thing called physical matter, right? Which is what everything we've done with Tashi, Tashi, Tashi, Tashi, okay?

You got it down with Tashi, says Lord Buddha. Now just apply that to everything else in the universe, okay? Take that explanation of how the three groups apply to a thing like physical matter, and then you can go apply that to all the other objects in the universe.

In fact, you could go back to the first turning of the wheel, you could go back to everything else mentioned in the first turning of the wheel, and apply it one by one to all the things mentioned there. For example, it says here, to the remaining four heaves, to the remaining four parts of a person, which as you know are discrimination, feeling, other factors, and consciousness, you can apply it to those as well. First, you can apply it to that.

Then, you can go ahead and apply it to the 12 gates of the senses, okay? Then, you can go ahead and apply it to the 12 links of dependent origination. Then, you can go ahead and apply it to the 4 kinds of sustenance, and then you can go ahead and apply it to the 6 categories, and then you can go ahead and apply it to the 18 if you want, 6 or 18 categories, doesn't matter, take each one, take each one of them one by one, and you can take those three attributes that we talked about, which are constructs, changing things or dependent things, and yongdup or emptiness, totality, and you can apply each of each of the three has an application with every single object mentioned in that list I just gave you, which is the content, which is the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, not that how those three apply them, but those, you know, describing all those objects in themselves is the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, so you can go back to the first turning of the wheel, take all that stuff that Lord Buddha talked about, and then examine how each one of those objects individually, how the three groups can apply to each one individually, and then you're done, you're set. Okay, once you understand it with that guy, Tashi, that's

[Speaker 2]
what I'm talking about, that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the

[Speaker 1]
subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel, and that's the subject matter of the first turning of the wheel.

So, you can have the Noble—I'm sorry, Arya Truth of Suffering, and you could be focusing on it. It's a changing thing or a dependent thing, and you can be examining it, how you conceptualize of it in a general way, and how you conceptualize of its characteristics, which is you know, having a construct about it as a whole and then having a construct about one of its features. So here's an example.

When you look at the Arya Truth of Suffering and you say, this is the Arya Truth of Suffering, then you are having a construct about it, which regards it whole, which is regarding the whole truth in itself. And then when you go ahead and say, which the Buddha said, the big quality or the big feature of the Arya Truth of Suffering is that it's something you have to figure out that is happening to you. Yomsa Shepa told me, your relationship to the first Arya Truth is supposed to be that, just figure out that that's who you are, that you are suffering.

Just to figure that out is a big achievement. So the Buddha said, what should your relationship be to the first of the Arya Truth? Just to realize you're having it.

When you look at the first Arya Truth and you think about it, this is something I'm supposed to realize is happening to me, then you are having a construct about a feature of the first Arya Truth. So there's a case where you have a construct about the first Arya Truth in general, and you're also having a construct about a feature of the first Arya Truth, which is the feature that you better figure out that it's happening to you. So that's an example of a construct through words and thoughts, which is regarding the first of the Arya Truths.

Then he says you can go on and describe that with all the other Arya Truths, you can go on and describe the When, When, Why about the other Arya Truths, and not only is it true of how concepts apply to the first Arya Truth, but you can also apply, think about how the quality of those three features. So, with that, we described how constructs apply to the first Arya Truth, both towards the first Arya Truth as a whole, and towards the first Arya Truth as we focus on one of its characteristics, which in this case was, you better figure out it's happening to you. But how does the second grouping, meaning Shen Wang, meaning the fact that things are, you know, that cause things, how does cause things relate to the first Arya Truth?

Very simple. They are cause things. That is the Shen Wang of the first Arya Truth.

You see, the very fact that the first Arya Truth is a changing thing is how the first Arya Truth possesses a quality of being Shen Wang. So, the first attribute applies because you can say of the first Arya Truth, this is the first Arya Truth. The second attribute applies because the first Arya Truth is a changing thing, and the third attribute applies because the thing, the quality, the construct about it that doesn't exist with regard to it, is its yongdung, is the emptiness of the first Arya Truth.

So you've got how constructs relate to the first Arya Truth, you've finished how the fact that it's a changing thing relates to the first Arya Truth, and you've got how emptiness relates to the first Arya Truth. Again, all three attributes or all three groups, how they apply to the first Arya Truth. Once you get it with the first Arya Truth, you get it with the rest of the Arya Truth, and then you can go on to explain the thirty-seven qualities of enlightenment in the same way, and you've covered the subject matter of the first Turning of the Wheel.

When I went through those three things, and we were covering them with the kid, Dasi, and everything like that, and then we got finished, and I said to you, do you guys agree that the same reasoning could be applied to every other object in the universe? And you said, sure. Everybody said, sure.

So here it is, you know, we're doing it. And they're covering every object there is, and it's the same thing.

[Speaker 2]
I said, you know, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I So Geshe-la, he had two explanations here.

[Speaker 1]
First he started out by saying, with regard to that last page, page 25, in that whole area, in that whole section there have been different ways of explaining it, okay? Different ways of explaining what Je Tsongkapa meant, and there have grown up different, And very, very great masters have expressed different opinions about how to interpret these last few pages and this whole section that we've been on. For example, in the different textbooks of the different monasteries, you'll find slightly different explanations of those two pages, and there'll be a little bit of some issues arising in this area.

And then he kind of rested that, and then he went on to say, by the way, let's go back to page... Let's go on to page 26. This is a wrap-up.

Don't mean... This is a wrap-up, okay? You're getting a wrap-up by Lord Buddha and by Je Tsongkapa here, on all the points that have come up to here.

Don't forget where we started from. We had the bodhisattva Dondang Yondra Phat has come to the Buddha and said, you know, Buddha, you gave this first turning of the wheel, and then you gave a second turning of the wheel, and in the first turning of the wheel you said certain things, and then in the second turning of the wheel you turned around and said, nothing has any existence by definition. And then I came up to you and I said, you know, Lord Buddha, it kind of seems like you're contradicting yourself possibly, or I don't understand what you had in mind when during the second turning of the wheel you went on and said, nothing exists by definition, when you had just said...

You kind of implied that it did in the first turning of the wheel. What did you mean when you said nothing existed by definition? And then the mind-only school has been saying, well, they've been quoting this same sutra.

In the same sutra, Lord Buddha says, you know, Dondang Yondra Phat, or bodhisattva, you know what I had in mind? I was thinking of these three attributes, or these three groups, and I was thinking that each of the three can apply to every existing object. So when I said things don't have any this nature, things don't have this nature, things don't have this nature, I was thinking of those three groups, or those three attributes, meaning constructs, things which depend on others, and totality, right?

In the sense of emptiness. I was thinking of those three groups. That's what I had in mind when I said that things didn't exist by nature, and that's what I was talking about.

I've clarified for you what each of those groups mean, and most importantly, I've demonstrated to you how each of those three groups applies to every single existing object in the world. Every single existing object in the world can be described as having some attributes of those, all three attributes, okay? Every existing object in the world can be described in terms of those three attributes applying to them, and that's what I had in mind of bodhisattva, Dondang Yondra Phat, and Dondang Yondra Phat now is replying to the Buddha's response, okay?

He asked a question, Buddha responded, and now on page 26, in the first half, the Buddha is, Dondang Yondra Phat is replying to the Buddha, and he says, I got it. Thank you very much. Okay.

Now, you know, you explained to me what you meant during the second turn of the wheel, and you said that that's not really what I meant, not literally. What I meant was this thing about these three groups, and these three kinds of lack of self-nature, and that's what I meant. And Dondang Yondra Phat goes, thank you very much, I understand what you're saying.

We have finished one major section, we're going on to a fourth major division. You know, I did mention this little issue that came up with difference between the textbooks of the different monasteries on a certain point in the last few pages, let's get to that tomorrow. We'll cover that tomorrow, okay?

I'm not going to try and do it today, we'll go on to that tomorrow, but now we've reached a whole different section. Don't forget I told you to make some marks on your, you know, write some stars at different places, that's where the problems lie. I'm not going to get into it today, you don't have to turn to it right now, we'll cover that tomorrow.

We'll get to that tomorrow. Case is closed, new case is closed, now we go on to a new section.

[Speaker 2]
I'm not going to get into it today, you don't have to turn to it right now, we'll go on to a new section. I'm not going to get into it today, you don't have to turn to it right now, we'll go on We're about to go on to a new section, if I tried to go into any detail on it, I would be interrupted by this irritating little voice clock, so all I can do is give you a quick rough out of what we're going to hit in this section, okay?

[Speaker 1]
This section is called Drupdun. Drupdun means, it's a difficult word in Tibetan, I've had trouble with it before, but what he said, he described it very nice, Geshe-la described it very well. It's, Drupdun means, almost like a profit resulting from a transaction.

So there's been a give and take, there's been an exchange going on, and due to those different transactions, due to all that exchange, some kind of conclusion, some kind of result, some kind of profit is going to be an outcome, you can call it like an outcome of the exchange. What is the exchange? That Bodhisattva Duryodhana has presented a question to the Buddha, what did you mean when you said, this in the second turning of the wheel, and then you turned around and said, I'm sorry, you said this in the first turning of the wheel, and then you turned around and said this in the second turning of the wheel, what were you talking about?

And then the Buddha has given an answer, and Duryodhana Prakash listened to it, and Duryodhana Prakash said, okay, I got it, and the whole outcome, there's some kind of outcome or conclusion to be reached from the exchange, and that's the subject of this section. What kind of outcome or what kind of conclusion has been produced by this exchange between the Lord Buddha and his disciple? Well, because Lord Buddha has been speaking with language where he kept saying, you know what I really had in mind, or you know what I meant to say, or what I was really thinking of all during that, because he's using language like that, one immediate outcome is that we understand that the first and second turnings of the wheel are not to be taken literally.

Okay, so one automatic outcome is that, oh, because the Buddha's been using this kind of language, you know, what I really had in mind, or what I meant to say, you know, what I wanted you to understand, because he's been using that kind of language about the first two turnings of the wheel, then we can say that in the mind-only school, the first two turnings of the wheel are considered to be figurative, spoken figuratively, and not to be taken literally.

But you know, this whole exchange is the third turning of the wheel, okay? This bodhisattva going to the Buddha and saying, what did you mean when you say that? And the Buddha saying, hey, here's what I meant in the first two turnings of the wheel, that is the third turning of the wheel.

That exchange itself is the third turning of the wheel. Now that exchange, where the Buddha seems to be baring his soul, you know, and saying, okay, here's what I really meant, you know, and this is what I really intended to say, now that seems to be something we can take literally, because now the Buddha seems to be speaking in absolute terms, in totally literal terms, you know, he's saying, you know what I really had in mind, to tell you from my heart, yantra-bhagavata, this is what I really had in mind. And then the Buddha, speaking in that sort of frank, honest, you know, this is what I really had in mind terms, then we can take the third turning of the wheel, another outcome of the exchange, another profit from all the transactions, that we can come to realize that the third turning of the wheel, according to this school, is something literal. And that's a rough out of this section for you guys, which I can't, you know, I'm not going to smooth it out now, because the thing's going to go off, okay?

So, suppose somebody comes up to you some day and says, what was the third turning of the wheel? Okay? And you'll be all ready to give a great answer, you know, you'll say, well, you know, there was this bodhisattva, Duryodhana Prak, and until he asked his question, until the moment that he asked his question, a third turning of the wheel has not yet occurred, you see?

And then there comes this bodhisattva, Duryodhana Prak, and he says, oh, Lord Buddha, you know, what about this? I'm having trouble with this idea. And then the Buddha comes and gives his answers.

You know, if they were writing a book at the time, if they had both been writers, then it would have been about ten pages of questions written by Duryodhana Prak, and then maybe twenty pages of answers by Lord Buddha, and we would have taken those thirty pages of conversation, and that would have been a book called Third Turning of the Wheel, you know? So, when you think about, if someone comes up to you and says, what is the third turning of the wheel? You got to say, oh, that's when that bodhisattva asked those questions, and Lord Buddha gave those answers, and that's what the third turning of the wheel is.

When I said, if they had been writers, and if they had been writing it down at the time, the bodhisattva's questions would have taken about ten pages, and the Buddha's answers maybe twenty pages of answers apply, and then said that the third turning of the wheel is thirty pages. I'm not... I don't want you to take that literally, okay?

You know, I'm not saying, you know, the third turning of the wheel is thirty little pages, and that's all there is to the third turning of the wheel. Okay? I'm sure you won't take that literally.

I'm just trying to give an... I'm just trying to give an illustration of how the third turning of the wheel was.

[Speaker 2]
That's what I'm not... There's a danger that the third turning of the wheel is thirty pages, and that's all there is to the third turning of the wheel. Okay?

I'm sure you won't take that literally. I'm just trying to give an...

[Speaker 1]
I'm just trying to give an illustration of how the third turning of the wheel was. There's a danger that you will be quoting me later, and they'll say, what's the third turning of the wheel? You'll say, well, Geshe Tutankhamen said the first ten pages are questions, and twenty pages are answers.

It's just thirty pages. That's the whole third turning of the wheel. I don't want you quoting me like that.

Oh, yeah. Okay. Ready?

Okay.

[Speaker 2]
Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Okay.