Бетси Грир — Книга 2: Интерлюдия о пустоте, занятие 69

[Speaker 1]
Hi. Hi. All right, that was the reply I was hoping for.

I think that was Venerable Kadding, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Nice to see you.

Thank you. Nice to see you too. Nice to see everybody.

Welcome to Schwenzon's Tower. As usual, we have a wonderful program lined up for you this evening, morning, afternoon, or whatever it is for you. Thank you, everyone, for joining.

We have had one slight schedule change today. Word, unfortunately, is sick, so we are not going to be having his class today. We will still entertain you for that hour, if you would like.

I will lead a Q&A, so you're welcome to come, especially if you have easy questions, just fun stuff to talk about. I'm a good person for that. I see some people are raising their hands, but I think everything is about translators and stuff.

Okay, thank you very much. I want to know if they can also ask hard questions. Oh, of course, whatever you want.

Oh, good, good, good, good. Okay, great. We'll find somebody to answer those.

So, are you ready? We have first Venerable Utpala's class, and I'm assuming she's here and ready to go. Hi, Nick.

Hello, how's it going? When you were saying, you know, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, it's like that's what's going on for me right now. Having returned from Asia, I really don't know what time it is.

I think my body right now wants to be asleep, but I will try my best to not fall asleep on you. I've noticed at times it helps people talk slower for the translators if they're super tired during their class. Thank you.

I'm just trying to think of a positive there. I'm sorry, jet lag is like the hardest thing ever. Yeah, let's...

As you're pulling up your homework, I'll embarrass myself. I once, I was jet lagged so bad. I was in Taiwan, and somebody was asking me a question, like, you know, during a DCI event and during the break, and I was sitting up and I fell asleep sitting up while they asked me the question.

And then I woke up and I was like four steps. That's very impressive, actually. No, I don't.

It's not. It's terrible. I was really embarrassing.

No, that you woke up and answered the question is... I wish I would give a sincere answer. It turns out they were asking where the bathroom was.

Oh, I see. I see. Well, that's...

How far away it was. A problem. In which case it was a circle genius.

It was close. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, you just give us the signal.

It's good. I do not have a quiz. But maybe those of you who were in the last class, which was just a couple of weeks ago, can help me recall what it was we were talking about.

So we're in the second half of K. Drupje's masterpiece on the interlude on emptiness. And we had finished, finally, the first part of the book, which is on Arya Asanga and Master Vasubandhu and what they think about this question of when to take the Buddha's teachings literally and when to take them figuratively.

And those two brilliant chariot drivers are the founders of the Mind Only School. So we finished that. And now we've moved on to the second half of the book, which is about Arya Nagarjuna's, another famed charioteer, his position on when the Buddha was speaking literally, when he said what he meant, and when he was speaking figuratively, when he was not.

K. Drupje, the author of our book, is just introducing Arya Nagarjuna in similar fashion to how he introduced Arya Asanga and Master Vasubandhu. In our last class, Geshe Michael gave us a list of a hundred some texts written by Arya Nagarjuna.

This is from Nick's book, which will be coming in 2025. And we talked about how when the Buddha says something like giving causes wealth, or when the Buddha says kill your father and your mother, both of those, K. Drupje said, we need to use, we need to interpret.

We cannot take them literally for two different reasons. Does anybody remember what these two examples, wealth comes from giving, and kill your mother, kill your father, what are the two ways that we take these differently? The two ways we, the two, what would you call them, situations that require interpretation.

The first one, oh, yes, Dodo was in the room. Dodo, please. D.

So, in the first occasion, it is because if we don't explain it, then everybody wouldn't understand it. So, that's why giving makes fortune, is a figurative teaching. And in the second occasion, if you take it literally, it will be very dangerous.

And that's why it is also a figurative teaching. That's a very good way of looking at it, I think. It's not exactly the way that we talked about it in the text.

K. Drupje said that in the first instance, those words, wealth comes from giving, are not about the ultimate state of things. So, they must be interpreted.

But I'd like to, you know, we do have to explain just how does that work? How is it that giving causes wealth? Did someone say something?

D. No. K.

Okay. And then in the instance of kill your father and your mother, he said that's not suitable to be taken as truth. And we have to interpret another meaning.

Why is it not suitable? Probably because the Buddha set forth, you know, in Vinaya, ways we should behave, ways we should act. And that these ways primary amongst them is not harming others.

So, it would be basically impossible for the Buddha to be saying, kill your father and your mother, and mean that. D. Seems right.

That's right. It contradicts a lot of other stuff he said. K.

Yes. But we are faced with this, as students of the teachings of the Buddha, we are faced with this problem, right? Because there is the appearance of the Buddha having contradicted himself in different ways.

Namely, the one that concerns us the most, because it's all around the very key to getting out of the circle of suffering, is what did he mean when he said that nothing has any nature of its own? And he said different things in different teachings. And we talked a lot about that in previous classes.

So, going on now to what else did we talk about in Kyoto? Oh, we just started going through the list of books. And as my homework, which I admit to you all, that I have not yet done, I was to translate a book by Arya Nagarjuna, so that I could answer the question as to whether this book that's called A Hundred Kinds of Wisdom, Shariputra, is actually about wisdom or something else.

So, I haven't finished that yet, but I will finish it for the next class. Cool. Is it super short?

It's short, but not like super short. Good job. Do you have the text?

I do. Exciting. That's awesome.

That's right. He didn't do that in the class. I saw him going onto an elevator and he says, oh, Upala, wait.

Could you translate this text of Arya Nagarjuna's, please, and answer this question, is Kedrubche right, that it's not about wisdom, or is it what it sounds like? You don't want to prove Kedrubche wrong, you know. I don't want to prove Geshe Michael wrong.

I don't want to prove Kedrubche wrong. It's a real catch-22. Yep.

The elevator pitch. Right. Absolutely.

Okay. So, we are going to kick up again in the text after that last bit. Let's see.

I'm sharing challenge, so just bear with me. Sharing challenge? Yeah.

I'm challenged with regard to sharing on Zoom. Oh, my daughter is sharing challenge, but... Oh, with regard to her toys?

Yes. Yes. No, I would love to share my toys.

I want to share with you this one, I believe. Oh, sorry. I should have gone to the place and not driven you all mad.

Oh, that brings back memories, this list. I bet it does. So, we're going to pick up here.

Do you see 427? Yes. Perfect.

You can Zoom in if you want to. I can try to Zoom in. For us older folks.

Oh, I can Zoom in myself, too. Uh-huh. Yeah, you can.

Is that better? Yeah, it's great. I just remembered that each of us has our power to Zoom in as much as we want.

Okay. So, I lost the chat. Where did the chat go?

Let's see if I can get the chat back. No, I don't know where it went. Yeah, sorry.

Now I'm chat challenged. So, I can't see you in the chat. Sorry.

I need a master. We'll let you know if something critical happens here. Okay.

I just need a master to teach me how to use Zoom. You kind of have to move the pointer around really fast until the chat button. It's like, I don't think there's a perfect way.

Oh, there it is. I did just move the cursor around. And there it came.

Okay. Excellent. Thank you, Nick.

You are a master of Zoom. All right. If it's too big, just smack it.

So, would someone like to read? I know that there were a number of people in Kyoto who were excited to read. So, there must be some people here who would be excited to read.

Well, Venerable Karin, I see your lovely smiling face. Could you please read? Thank you.

And by the way, my last note from your last class was that you were leaving us on a cliffhanger. So, I'm very excited. Well, let's see if we've reached the cliff.

I promise I will not push anyone over the edge. We hope you do. Thank you so much.

Thank you. So, I bet that Nick could translate this in an instant. Possibly.

Because he translated that, or wrote that long list of texts by Arya Nagarjuna. But let's start at the beginning here. Kepar, does anyone know Kepar?

So, Kepar Sabbo. Probably, especially regarding the deep teachings here. Yeah, I took it as, is special insight.

Yeah, maybe. Maybe. Provisionally.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, makes sense. Special tea. Yeah, specialty.

And Sabbo, I did find that one possible English equivalent of Sabbo was insight. So, it could be his, Kepar's feature or specialty, and then Sabbo would be profound. So, his profound specialty.

Uma, we know as? Middle Way. Middle Way, yes.

And this would be Uma Lam, the path of the Middle Way. And Selward Chepa. He made it real clear.

Yeah, clarifying, clarifying the path of the Middle Way. So, it looks like, I guess he's saying, especially, these are the books that specifically clarify the path of the Middle Way, right? Yeah, he wrote on a bunch of stuff, but especially, or his specialty, was clarifying the profound path of the Middle Way.

Right, so if we come down here to the verb. He wrote them. Itse, which means to compose or write.

And then we have this particle here, nam, which is a pluralizing particle. So, we know this is following. A big one, in this case.

Something that is more than one. But let's go back up farther to here. Dekonani.

Does anyone remember what Dekonani means? Suchness? Suchness, yes.

And mi-den. We've been talking about. Yeah.

The true meaning. The definitive meaning, yeah. So, oh, cool.

The definitive meaning of suchness. And then we have this phrase here. Lungang jarne tonpa do kunle tuh.

Which, we've seen kunle tuh before. Yeah, compendium. Yeah, samuchaya, compendium.

And we've got do, which is sutra. And then we've got tonpa, which is to teach or reveal or demonstrate from. And then we've got lungang jarne.

Scripture and practice, I guess. This dang could be with instead of and. Like by combining together.

Scriptural authority on this topic of the definitive meaning of suchness. Into a compendium. To a compendium.

Yeah, right. Yeah, he jarred, he jarred, he like put together a bunch of lung into a sutra, samuchaya, which is probably the name of a book. Yep.

Rikbi Timpanamu. Well, we know it's a name of a book, but not written by him. Right.

Could be. He had some, you can search that list if we wanted to. Oh, okay.

I mean. I won't do it here because it will make everyone dizzy. Yeah, yeah.

But. I remember some of his titles seemed familiar. Right, so then we get into a list that is, should be really familiar to those of us who've been involved in the mixed nuts classes, as well as some retreats that Geshe Michael has had.

So we've got Rikbi Timpanamu, so this is talking about a book. The collection of works on logic. Mm-hmm.

Which use logical reasoning. Mm-hmm. Then we've got Tsawa Shera.

Most of them. The root text on wisdom. Then we've got Rikpa Drukchupa, which is 60 verses on reasoning, which Nick loves very much.

Om Nid Dönchupa. Mm, 70 verses. Which is, usually we see this as the 70 verses on reasoning, but here it says the 70 verses on emptiness.

And the Sanskrit would seem to suggest that it's that as well, because it's Shunyata Saptaktir. Yeah. I'll put that here.

And we know Shunyata is emptiness. Then we have Dzundok. Stop him.

Now, would you put a heavy prenatal with a ba prefix as well? Should it be Dzundok? Dzundok.

Geshe Michael says Dzundok when he says it. Okay, Dzundok, which Geshe Michael has translated as ending all argument. Dzundok we know is to debate, right?

Or a debate. Yeah. And Dzundok.

Geshe Michael translates this as crushing to a fine dust. And then another favorite of Nick's. Oh, I doubt it.

And Trengla. Good one. I recommend it.

Favorite of Xiaoping's too, but for a different reason. Her book is named the same thing. String of Precious Jewels.

I believe that book is where the giving creates wealth comes from as well. We didn't get there yet, but I think it's from this book. Oh, cool.

Okay, so we have this long list of books. And then Geshe Michael kindly copied for us from the introduction, a discussion about the six books. Since K.

Drupje next, I think, goes into what these six books, what their specialty is. So, I thought we would just move on. And let's see.

Monica Torres, would you like to read? She's translating. She's translating.

Yay, thank you for translating. Oscar, would you like to read? Yes, thank you.

Great, thank you so much. Thank you. So, let's see.

I like to go to find the verb first. And it's a very interesting verb. Trupa.

Does anyone know what trupa means? Is this the one that means like emanation? Like emanate?

Or elaborate? Oh, elaborate, okay. All I could find was like shine forth.

But I haven't done a, you know, looking through all the already translated books. But that would be fine if we were elaborating. So, okay, good.

So, Dayong here, I'm taking as, excuse me. Oh, I can't hear. So, I'm sorry.

Dayong, I'm taking as namely. But hopefully, you will see why I think that later on. Trupa.

Logicians should know this well, yeah? The subject or the thesis to be proven. Uh-huh.

Dengu, as an abbreviation of dentrup k'inngupo, which is. Like real things? Things established, truly existent things.

Gokpa. A lot of logic that denies that. Yeah.

And rikpa is the reasoning. And kyepar. Extensive.

Extensive. I don't normally hear that word used with Arya Nagarjuna. He's Mr. Succinct in my book. Maybe you have a lot of succinct reasonings. Yeah, maybe it's a lot of succinct reasonings, yeah. Tungpaat, demonstrate or show, sawasheva.

So, oh, good. Now, here's something we know. Root text on wisdom.

So, root text on wisdom. Sets forth in great detail reasonings that refute truly existing things. Nice, nice.

Tung, take a breath. Okay, good. We have our dengu again.

Truly existing things or things truly exist. And here we're going to have a little grammar lesson. We've got drupha and then we've got drupje.

Debate grammar. Right. So, drupja is drupha.

Sorry, this camera's right in front of the text. Maybe I can move it. There.

Drupha, druphe drupje. So, drupje is reasoning. And drupha is to prove or establish.

So, druphe. The proofs for proving. What's that?

The proofs for proving. The proofs for proving. Yeah.

Then we've got shengi. By others. Takpa, we remember from emptiness meditations text.

We talked a lot about takpa, which is to label or impute. And tokge is another word for logic. But it also could be sophistry, which could be Kejapche's way of getting a little dig into somebody, which I think he may be doing.

Sikten chudru, the 16 meanings of words. Lasokpa and the like. Did you search Master Nagarjuna's list to see if he had a title that contains something like that?

I don't think that's his. Because of this little, I'm thinking, dig. Yeah.

And because we're talking about proofs for proving things is truly existent. I'm thinking this is probably written by, well, then we have here others. It could be Master Baba Veneka.

So, I will search and find out if there is something called the 16. There are 16 categories in the non-Buddhist Nyaya school, the logician school, which are their formulation of reality or something. So, if it was by others, their way, it's refuting their way of using 16 categories, these other logicians' way of using 16 categories to establish real things.

That's lovely. So, what is the name of that group again? Nyaya.

We call them the logicians in Great Ideas. Great. Thank you so much.

That's why we made me do this. And that's why they make us do team stuff. Okay.

And another reason why I think it's got to be someone that we wouldn't agree with is because we're going to gopa, we're going to refute, or we're not going to, but shipmonam tak, crashing to a fine dust, refutes that logic, which he wrote. And I'm taking this law to be as well as sundok, ending argument. So, I'm taking this, this law is like setting up a whole other, setting up this as a phrase that hangs together, because this me shows up again.

I think it's, oh, if I may. Yeah. Because there's the verb, right?

So, it's kind of ending that section right there. Shipmonam tak does that. And then sundokni, as for stopping all argument.

Okay. It's an extension of the first chapter of the text on wisdom. So, it's using tripa, like not like an elaboration, but like an extension.

Like it can. Yeah. So, it's an extension of the first chapter.

Yeah. J, I think that they're called J's.

[Speaker 2]
Cool.

[Speaker 1]
That this is chapter. I think so. I remember it being a really weird word for chapters, but somebody who was at one of the recent Arya Nagarjuna retreats may remember better than I do.

Cool. Now, what about spelling the root text on wisdom in this way? Oh.

Whoa. Oh, it's Rabje. That's why.

It's Sashe Rabje. Rabje is the name of the chapter, is the word for it. So, it's not Shadab at all.

Oh, okay. That's good. Rabje.

Yeah, Rabje means chapter. So, Rabje Danpa means the first chapter. Excellent.

I had a feeling something was wrong. And Sashe is the quick way that we say Tsawa Shadab. Oh, Sashe.

Even though She itself is not a word. Sashe. Oh, I mean, it's just saying Tsa, She.

There probably should be a, that's weird, right? It should be She. It just comes up.

I see it in dictionaries as a variant that exists, a sort of a shorthand that someone else seems to have noticed. Even though you would expect the Tsa on the end. Right.

Right. Okay, cool. Apparently, it's not unheard of.

Right. Okay, so we've got Enigal argument being an extension of the first chapter of the root text on wisdom. That's pretty cool.

Okay, moving along. Marina, would you like to read? It's a short one.

I can't see if you're shaking your head. I'm shaking my head. Geshe Micah replaced yin with yu.

So, means things. Things, yeah. I think we're using the more general idea of mupo here and not a functioning thing or a working thing, but just things.

Mupo nam. Rongshin, or I should say Rongshin. Their essence, the nature of things.

Right. The true nature of things. K'ien latsog.

So, k'ien. Condition. Condition, or circumstance.

Yeah. Latsog. Causes.

What's that? Almost causes. I mean, in this context, almost suggests that.

Right, in this context. Because normally we see k'ien as a secondary cause or like the conditioning factors. Like the earth and the water, the sunlight, or the cause of a tree, which is a seed.

Right, right. But without the earth and the water and the sunlight, the tree's not going to grow. Yin mayin.

Its nature isn't in there. Do not exist. Yeah.

In the circumstances or the causes and so on. Yeah, yeah. So the true nature of things does not exist in the causes.

End quote. So does anyone want to take a guess as to which philosophical school that might be taking a jab at? Oh, a lot, I think.

I think that's a common historical idea, that the true nature of a thing is its cause. I think that's a Sankhya thing also. I think, yeah, maybe a lot of different schools would say something to that effect.

Right. The functionalist in general, isn't it, that things are dependent upon their causes and conditions? Right.

So it's the first three schools of Buddhism. So yeah, this smells of middle way. A middle way critique.

So then we have another verse. And do I have a volunteer? No, volunteering doesn't work.

Dodo, would you like to read, please? Yes, ma'am. Okay.

So I kind of tied these two together, and proposing that would be something like, if it's the case that All stuff. Always. Everything's nature, the nature of all things.

The self nature of all things, right, is not an existing thing. So if it's the case, the self nature of all things does not exist. So, would be your, and sick is words.

Right. Also, your words also are without a self nature. So.

So, what does that mean? You can't. Cannot.

Right. Unable. I decided to be a little bit poetic and say powerless.

Yeah. Powerless to That's cool. refute a self nature.

If it's the case that the self nature of all things does not exist, your words also are without self nature, powerless to refute self nature. Good point. That's got to be somebody else.

It is taken from an entirely different text. Oh, I was thinking Nagarjuna would say something like that too. So, um, so then we come down here to Kedavji's explanation of what's going on with these quotes.

And we know that because he starts with she. So, and then he just basically repeats the entire first line. If it's the case that all things are without a self nature.

I mean, he didn't have the Kuhn in there, but that's okay. Kyokitsik Lung, another word for also, don't have a self nature. Your words also don't have self nature.

Deitana, if it's like that, um, tsikishen ki tsikde shen ki um, I always get confused when, when this particle shows up after the first word in a phrase. Tsikde, are those? Those, those words.

Okay. But were words other than those? Uh, tsikde, um.

Tsikde shen, is it, does the shen modify the de? Or is it modifying the tsik? I think we're going to have to see the rest of the sentence.

Okay, let's move on. When in doubt, move on. Paratrooper bunnies.

Um, rongshen, I don't know what's going on there, but that's gone. Okay. So we know this word rongshen yu, uh, which is, hmm, there is a self nature, but then we've got this dom particle, which means or.

Oh, it's not dom chepa. Or it could be dom chepa. Or like dom cha.

Isn't, I mean, maybe I'm getting, in fact, I think you're right. I think if I was thinking it was dom cha, but that's G-D-A-M, right? I think it's dom chepa.

It means assertion, and it follows a gokpa. Right, we have these two together, chepa, gokpa. Um, oh, yeah, no, I'm confused.

Yeah, dom cha might be a position or something or. Well, it means a promise. Promise, yeah.

Or one who makes an assertion. Oh, dom cha is a position. Yeah.

It's a position. So it refutes the dom cha of grangshin, a nature existing that the others have. So shengi, others position.

Okay, great. Yeah, those words. Yeah, tiktay refute, by these words, refute the position that others have.

Yeah. Well, in this case, mite, it should not be able to refute others' position. The tang, nor should it be able to drup establish.

Well, see, I put these together, dak drup ki jache mite par gyuroh. That it would be illogical to refute or establish. Yeah.

Yeah. That sounds right. But this one up here is giving me little headaches.

Well, the refute and establish, there's, what it would establish would be the the rangshin mepe rangluk, our own position, right? So rangluk, as opposed to shen, our position of a lack of self. Oh, okay.

Okay, so this is or, sort of. Yeah, the and is or. Sorry, the and is or, that's terrible.

The tang is or. Yeah. Right.

And then the, it's weird because the gak and drup, I think, yeah, it points to the two different things that happen. So it can't gak the first one or drup the second one. Words with no nature can't gak, can't refute others' positions that there is a true nature, nor can it prove our position that there's no true nature.

So what is. I was going to be saying that, yeah, there's something confusing, right? Like, tseg de sheng gi rangshin yipar dam chepar gokpa.

It seems like it's saying, these words do refute the positions, the position that others hold, that things have their own nature. And, or. Or but.

Yeah, but rangshin mepe ranglug, our position that things have no nature being established, things like establishing it, gak drup ki ja je, it's incorrect to say that it's a thing which could deny or establish. And that's what, that's what tsepa says, probably tsendok. Yeah, it can't do either one.

Yeah, right. It can't, it can't deny, it can't prove. And these are examples of things that it can't deny and can't prove.

So I think the mete distributes gepar extensively. It could be before the comma, before the shape. So we distribute to this, this.

Yes. Yes. And, and the other drup, the, the drup before the tsepa, the drupa, it goes to three places, I think.

So it goes to that gokpa, it goes to the drupa. Yeah, no, the left, the drupa to the left of that, not that drupa. I mean, yes, that drupa goes to that drupa, but it also goes to the gak drup.

Yeah, gak drup maybe is summarizing, maybe. Yeah, yeah. He's like, it can't, it can't deny other people's position.

You can't prove our position. You can't deny our position. Okay, right.

It's not, these are examples of things that can't gak in drup, without the so. It does what it, that's what it looks like is happening to me. Great.

And then it says she, tsepa, somebody said that, and then he's going to quote, some drup maybe? Some debate, so. That's their debate, yeah, I guess.

Or debate. So the 431 is as far as I got, so now we can go into new territory together. Uh-oh.

In our remaining seven minutes. Thank goodness. De dokpe, oh, someone to read, please.

Nick, could you read, please? Absolutely. Okay.

Cool, thank you. Okay, so our verb here is interesting. Is, is taught?

Sumpa, and it is, yeah, it is taught. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, that book says whatever this is.

Or by, by these words or something? Well, it seemed like he was quoting something. Sumpala, quoting something.

So you think this is, this is a quote? Yeah, up to sumpa yen. I mean, I think the, yeah, the book is this.

We're talking about what the book does, like what this sumpa is, like what he says in this book. In order to deny them, right? Right, in order to deny, right, that.

By these words of a nature of their own. Yeah, by these, right, yeah, right. With these words that don't have a nature of their own.

That's great. We can't deny. Seems like he's about to say, as far as denying the systems of others and proving.

Deny that system and prove our system. Yeah, great. In a way which is correct.

Yeah, real nice. We have a system for doing that, which an extensive system for doing that, which is just fine. Yeah.

Yeah, it teaches that. In the text called tsundoke, stopping all argument. Yeah, with the rest of that text, like what's the remaining text is spent on that.

All the remaining. Tsundoke must be the rest of the book. Let's see.

The many remainings. Yeah, it looks like he's talking about, he looks like he's kind of saying that the subject of that book is how to show that words with no meaning can do so many powerful things. Words with no nature of their own.

That's great. How delightful is that? What do you think that this is then?

I don't care. Shay. How we ended the previous section.

Maybe he's saying as for, maybe it's something like as for that, as for tsundoke, because now he's talking about tsundoke. I don't know. Or it could be saying as for how to dispute or how to debate.

Like how can we debate? Tsundoke, he's introducing something. Right.

So either how can we use words to debate or ask for the words of that book? Like a shortcut for tsundoke. Yeah.

It's woven in there. It says tsipala de dokpe chirdu in order to stop arguments. Yeah, those arguments.

Yeah. Okay. I like that.

Yeah. I kind of like. Yeah.

Obviously, you're gonna have to sit with it with a nice cup of coffee. Yeah. Okay.

We've got three minutes. Ben, can you read this one? Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. It looks like the chirdu is doing the same thing it did above. The first line.

It is, what did we say? I know it starts with ex. Extension.

Extension. Okay. An extension of the seventh.

No, the seventh verse of the root text on wisdom. Okay, so the. We decided that Rabja is a chapter.

Right. So the non-adverse chapter. Got it.

So the tongni dunshupa, the 70 verses on emptiness or reasoning, also is an extension of or from the seventh chapter of root. Root wise. Yeah.

Root wise. And then we have. Hmm.

That chapter. From that chapter. But it does the same.

Okay. Yeah. As for that chapter.

Milam. Dream. Dream.

I think milam jishim as in a dream. Like a dream, like an illusion. Yeah.

Like a dream. Like an illusion. Like a dream.

Yeah. It's got that diamond cutter feel to it. Milam jishim.

And ji is like a chi. Like whatever. Illusion.

Whatever appears in. That sounds like a meter thing to me. Totally.

Like jishim versus shin. Yeah. I bet you might.

Probably. You can probably take some poetic license and make this sound super mystical. Right.

May have to have a glass of wine. As Keisha Michael says, figuratively. Or a whole bottle.

Have a glass of wine before you translate this. Good idea. As ill-advised as other figurative teachings.

Do we want to continue working on this verse? Or start chatting about what we have worked on thus far? It's okay.

You're on a roll with these cliffhangers. Okay. We have another cliffhanger.

Just like illusions in a dream. Yeah. If your teacher were here, I bet you he'd at least give you that verse for homework.

It's going to be all these verses we've done thus far. Right. That's true.

Yes. As well as the other book by Nagarjuna. As well as the other book.

I will prepare those for January's class. Right. That's right.

You've got till next year to do it. This does look fun. This verse from 70.

Now it's making me want to read the seventh chapter of Sashay. Exactly. Exactly.

So. Let's talk about what we've talked about. Whoa, whoa.

All right. So, I mean, it's pretty provocative to say that if nothing has any self-nature, how is it that someone could use words to say that something doesn't have a self-nature? How is that even possible?

Yeah. I love this. I love this kind of type of discussion.

It's so cool. How is it possible that it's the... This is obvious, right?

But Geshe Michael used to say this. If you don't believe that something, that just because something doesn't have any nature of its own, means it doesn't exist or it doesn't function, then take your imaginary body and walk into the imaginary road in front of an imaginary bus and see what happens. I think he said, don't do that.

But yes. Right. Yes, of course.

I think it's like, what do you think would happen if you... I think he really said, take a pen and draw mustaches. He said, I love it because he says, it'll break your illusory legs.

You'll go to the illusory hospital. And my favorite part is he says, you'll get an illusory bill. That's very...

By the way, that's very... Very Geshe Michaelian. You can stop the screen share.

I mean, if you... Oh, great. Thank you.

So we can see our beautiful faces. Collectively, it's true. That's what I mean.

Well, there's at least two of them here on the screen. No, there's at least... Many.

Thank you, brave souls for having your cameras on. Yeah. But it's still the question always should...

It's cool if that question comes up, right? These words have no nature. So they don't truly prove anything.

So do they truly... Well, yeah. And somehow KJJ is going to tie this into what is literal and what is figurative.

I bet really soon. Kind of a cool segue he's taken. But it does sound like every...

What is it? It's sophistry? Like every illogical argument that...

Like when someone uses logic to say that they don't believe in logic. You know? I think sophistry is the right word, yeah.

Yeah, right. That's right. Even the opponent is guilty of what they are accusing us of if they think they can use logic that way.

But they say that the words do have meaning. So maybe they're covered. I have this feeling about words in our head.

And I think it's easy to write off the blah blah in the back of our brain as meaningless. But one of the things that really hit me in retreat being quiet... People that ask me sometimes, did you ever get into an utterly wordless state where there was just no words for anything anymore?

And no, I didn't. But the words in my mind were louder when I wasn't speaking out loud. And it showed me how...

I'm sorry to say mean. They were. That there was a lot of...

I was very hard on myself. And I always think of this... I don't know if I should say who it is, though.

This person has passed, an older gentleman who would yell at his partner. And he never understood why he would yell at his partner. I don't know why.

It just comes out of me. And then we came to meet him one day, and he didn't know we were there. And he was yelling at himself alone.

Like, yeah, so stupid. I don't know why the heck I'm trying to whip a... Golly, such a jerk.

And I don't... And it just occurred to me that if there's this... Whatever, meaningless string of abuse going on in the back of your head, right?

Not based on it. Just bubbling up. Then when someone else is in front of you, right?

You want to be kind to someone else. You think you would never do that to someone else. But you're not going to be able to stop it.

Even if the words don't... They don't really mean anything. It's not really based on anything.

It's just a chain of events happening. It's just causes bubbling up. It's seeds.

It's little karmas. It's little habits. It's little tendencies to just have these thoughts.

It's going to hurt other people too. And I really felt this sense that I wasn't... I had to be kinder with my words in my head.

They're just words. It's just blah, blah. But somehow I had to be kinder with those words.

Or to myself, if I wanted to be kinder to other people. Yeah, that was one of the methods I used to get out of depression. Was instead of calling myself all kinds of words that I can't repeat in public.

I started calling myself sweetheart. I mean, those other names would come up. And then I would go, oh, no, sweetheart.

Yeah. And at first it was just like, oh, that's just ridiculous. You know, you never talk like that to anybody.

But I kept doing it. And by golly, if it didn't seem to make a difference. That's great.

That's great. Like you were telling yourself, how could this word work? It has no power of its own because I don't really mean it.

And then you kept doing it. That's very inspiring. And you know, Paula, backing that up.

I talk to myself like my little four-year-old little girl. I try to speak to her and soothe her and calm her. The way I would love to be calmed by a mother.

And that's really helped me remember to speak kindly to others as well. It's so it's not, you know, the power doesn't exist inherently in the words, but the kindness that I can give to myself with my quiet thinking, with my words in my mind. I'm practicing to share that with others.

That's beautiful. That's really nice. That the thought of little like, baby, baby Ben, you know, baby Paula, baby.

Right. And I can, I can be hard on myself. But if I think of that little guy, I would never yell at him.

I wouldn't do that. Right. You wouldn't talk to your son that way.

No, but even if somehow I could go back in time and visit. You know, if you could go back in time and visit the baby version of you. Like, what would you like?

You would hug them. You would love them. You would want to encourage them.

And it is, in fact, not too late. They are right here. Yeah.

I mean, that's like a it's a practice that is actually well documented in Western psychology, at least in inner child work. I mean, what you're talking about, and it's amazing. But anyway, that's not what we're here to talk about.

But I did find what you guys were saying helpful in a different way, almost thinking this is funny, but I find it practical as a married person. Almost to think of the power that the words do have rather than that they don't. It's just the way that you were talking about it.

And sometimes when you hear someone else talking to you a certain way, this is what I liked about the story that you shared, Ben. When you hear somebody else talking to you in a certain way, and you're like, well, they just must have on some level, like if you really are surprised sometimes, sometimes you deserve it, I guess. But in a way that has no power.

Ah, but sometimes it could be helpful to think about that. That's the words that they're hearing in their mind. And that's why they're talking to you that way.

And I think that can be helpful to stop all argument, as Nagarjuna would say. Yeah. Another thing to sort of keep in mind is that the independent branch of the middle way is a part of the middle way.

And they would say that there's something inside a logical argument that would reach a conclusion. That words have power. Yeah.

It's weird. I often wonder this. I mean, this is less practical.

But, you know, when we kind of simplified the teaching on the schools, does the lower middle way assert that words have power, or does it just not deny enough? Well, it has to come together. There has to be some meaning in the word that is also understood as such by the one speaking and or hearing it.

Yeah. Those two have to come together. But alone, I'm not sure you could.

I don't know. Maybe we'll find out in this book. It would be fun if we go a little deeper into the independent branch.

But there's an appendix in the 60 verses that I spent many hours helping work on. And I'm still trying to figure it out. I just recently reread your appendix.

And it's hard and worthy of quite a bit of meditation on the question of whether that school means to say that words have their own nature, or whether we accuse them of being stuck with that position because of other things they've said. Well, because of other things they've said. So we're the ones with the problem with the words.

Yeah, exactly. That's a good point. Yeah, I think that the higher middle way method is to say something so wild and profound that your ignorance gets confused and hides in a hole for a minute.

And you're left in some sort of blissful state of... Yeah, like your ignorance gets confused and distracted for a moment. And you see reality.

Somehow Arya Nagarjuna's mysterious quips are supposed to lead us to a state of mind that is beyond seeing things as really one way or really another way. As opposed to talking someone into a position that's a new way of getting stuck in an idea. Right.

That's a good point. Obviously, words have no inherent nature. I just always think of Geshe Michael's arguments about what restaurant we should go to.

And I've used so many different forms of logic with Kendra about what sorts of restaurants we should go to on any given night. And it doesn't matter how tight my logic is. It doesn't convince her that she wants to go there.

Funny example. Speaking of words with no meaning, this conversation has just gone nowhere. No, I'm just kidding.

It's time to stop spewing words out into the world. This actually has been a fascinating conversation and a great exploration of your text. Thank you so much, Venerable Upala.

That was great. And it's nice to see you. And I hope that you recover fully from your jet lag with ease.

Thank you. But I really appreciate you showing up and leading the class. Yeah, of course.

Powering through. Um, I see Mr. Juan Hasso proudly standing by. Yay.

Deliver with words which have no nature of their own, the news. Thank you. I'll say one more thing.

Stay tuned. After Juan is finished, in about 15 minutes, I will lead a Q&A. If you would like to stay tuned, I will be here.

For all the hard questions. Yeah. Easy, easy, fun questions.

We can just blah, blah. So that'll be fun. All right.

Thanks, Juan. Take it away.

[Speaker 2]
Thanks, Nick. So I thought that was your way to introduce me. When you say speaking of words with no meaning, and I just laughed.

But anyways, thank you so much for keeping the fort every time Geshe-la goes on vacation. Because I don't know. I think it's very beautiful.

How you know, it's like more than 300 people tuning to these classes. And it's really, really wonderful that you guys keep doing it every single week. No matter what.

So congratulations. And thank you very much. So yeah, as you know, Geshe Michael and Veronica, they went out of town for a few days.

They are spending Christmas with family in Tucson. And then some of us that had the chance, opportunity to stay here in Sedona. We were, how to say, designated with a very special, important mission.

And I want to show you the pictures. So does any of you know who this one is? You can type in the chat if you know.

For one picture before, you can see that she's upset. And if you know why she's upset, you can also type in the chat. Her name is Ophelia.

Apparently the name comes from one of the characters in Shakespeare. I don't know which one. I don't know what book or anything.

But that's what I hear. And she's very upset because we are supposed to feed her every time, twice a day. Sometimes one, but it's okay.

But because today had a crazy, crazy day. One of my very good friends, Lindsay, went there. And can you show next picture, please?

Show up. And then she sees someone's coming. So she starts to relax.

And then we want to share what happened with the video. The first video we had this afternoon of her. Oh, yeah.

Well, that's a picture. But before that comes a video that I'm sure our dear tech table is going to figure it out very, very soon. Yay.

[Speaker 3]
We're here with Juan and his brand new t-shirt. Juan, tell us about this. I thought it was a picture.

So this is an idea that I'm having a problem with. It is a problem.

[Speaker 2]
We're having technical difficulties. Okay, let's start over. Welcome to today's Pitch Reward News.

Yes. Thank you so much. That's the video we had from Ofelia today.

Wonderful, right? Very, very beautiful. We couldn't ask for more.

Anyways. Okay. If it's not working, it's not working.

Oh, it's working now. Okay. Okay.

So Lindsay shows up there. She knows the recipe. She knows everything that needs to happen.

And Ofelia gracefully accepts the offering. So we are resting at peace because day one was accomplished. She's partaking of the food and the drinks we provided today for her.

And then you can see her eating happily in the next picture. And then we are so glad because for the next three days, while Geshe Michael and Veronica are with family celebrating Christmas, we will be taking care of Ofelia. So thank you so much for everyone who's making this possible.

Thank you, Lindsay. And thank you, Gina, as well for sharing the videos. Yay.

Yeah. Apparently Geshe Michael says that he's allergic to her, but he loves her so much. But it's difficult.

He says it's difficult. How can you love someone when it's so difficult to touch her? That's what he said the other day or something in those lines.

Anyways, she's super, super happy and super, super comfortable living in the rainbow house. Okay. In other news, Tim Lowenhaupt just came back from Taiwan and he shared with me a few videos and a few pictures from his trip.

Of course, we're going to collect more, but I want to show this little compilation he sent. And then I'll describe a little bit of what happened. So if we can, let's go to second video.

Video number two, please. Yes.

[Speaker 3]
We're here with Juan and his brand new T-shirts. Juan, tell us about this. So this is an idea that Professor Tim Lowenhaupt had in order to help us to fundraise for next year.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you so much for helping. I mean, she said somebody give it to her. But thank you so much for the interest and the good vibes.

Thank you, Tim, as well. So I don't know if Tim is here because he said he was going to try to be here to talk a little bit about it. But he's flying also to Pennsylvania to see his family.

He's from Pennsylvania and he went there for Christmas. So if he's not here, I guess we will have a talk with him later. But he sent these pictures and he told me a little overview of what happened.

After Japan, he helped Petri World News with some merch. He produced some T-shirts. I didn't know about it, but he produced some T-shirts that say, where is Juan?

I don't know. Apparently, because sometimes people look after me and they don't know where I am or something like that. You know, Tim's ideas.

But they sold very well. He helped us to collect some budget for next year. Thank you, Tim, very, very much.

Then he flew to Taiwan after Japan. And he said the people there are very, very excited and very, very receptive for the teachings. He's planning big things this year.

And also Brian Mendoza there, he presented some project on, you know, the Taiwan team is supporting so many projects all over the world. Especially they are supporting a lot Mexico and different projects happening there as the Migrants FMP4 and other things like Casa Huichol. Some of you may know Geronimo Aldo.

Many people, many of the teachers in Mexico, their background comes from link to Casa Huichol. So we want to thank a lot the people in Taiwan. And whenever Tim is available, we'll have a talk about it.

But I wanted also to remind you, because now we're talking about Brian. He designed a website where you can get to know how to use technology, tech skills, software and hardware. And these skills are specifically designed for whatever the worldview organizations need.

So I want to soon also have a talk with Brian about it. Just heads up, he's adding more and more tutorials in this website. You follow the QR code and you can sign up.

Don't worry, it's totally free. It may ask you for your information or something, but you don't have to pay anything. Just play along with the information, the registration, but it's totally free.

And you can access the videos that he designed in order to help us all to develop our tech skills, if that's something we feel interested in. Okay. And just a general reminder of the very, very upcoming projects before we move on is the New Year's retreat in Diamond Mountain with Yeltsin.

It's going to be on the 29th to the 3rd. I mean, I know it's almost coming soon, but if you're already in the American continent, which of course it goes from Alaska all the way to Argentina and Chile. That's what I mean by American continent.

So in a way, Mexicans are also Americans. You can make it. If you are in a different continent, it may be difficult, but if you really want, maybe you can still make it.

December 29th to January 3rd. And then in January, the Emptiness Meditations retreat. You can get your book there from Diamond Cutter Press and then get there, get to Diamond Mountain already with your book as a very good student on January the 17th.

And for those of you who are not going to go to this retreat, you are welcome to come to our New Year's event, which is going to be hosted at the Peachtree Cafe. It's going to go from, the program is going to go from 2 to 3 PM, only one hour. Geshe Michael is going to be there.

Geshe Michael is going to be presenting some of the very, very news on his own personal translation, Illumination of the True Thought, one of the most wonderful pieces that Jetsun Kappa wrote. And he's going to be talking about it as part of this wonderful, wonderful program. So you can sign up online or if you're around, come live.

After the event at 3, we're going to have a lunch party time, 3 to 5 PM and everyone is welcome. Okay, and finally, just to close, a few days ago, I wanted to show you a video, but we had technical difficulties. So I'm going to leave you with this video and then we can move on to wonderful Q&A with Nick Lachaud.

Hope you enjoy. It's just a summary of some things that I experienced or that I recorded in Kyoto. For me, it's like a way to summarize a little bit of the whole trip.

Hope you enjoy. And then we move on with Q&A with Tim Lachaud.

[Speaker 3]
Who has a train, okay? Don't look at the clothes in the while. Okay, check the person carefully.

Spend some time. You don't know how many hours I spent online to find a good suit, you know?

[Speaker 1]
I'm not going to go with some guy that's not beautiful. I'm going to find the best one. I found the best one.

I think it's the best one, maybe in the US or something. The fact that it is so crappy, like bad quality is why it's funny.