Бетси Грир — Книга 2: Интерлюдия о пустоте, занятие 75

[Speaker 1]
Hello, Mr. Leshaw. Hello, Mr. Kentaro. Hello, Ms. Inna. Hello, Mr. Ben. And hello, Ms. Cutting. And all the other folks in TV Land.

Ms. Ying Hui. This is kind of better than TV Land, right? You mean Zoom Land?

Yeah, way better. Yeah, ours is way better. We couldn't see everybody else if we were just on TV.

Well, you know, when I was a kid, speaking of which, I was a member of the Mickey Mouse Club. And I would put on my Mickey Mouse hat with the ears. And there was a special TV program.

And they would do a little bit when they were looking, the woman on the TV was looking in the mirror, and she would say, Oh, hello, Betsy out there in TV Land. And she would call people's names because their parents would send their names in and, and they would call out names. We had the appearance, false as it may be, which all appearances are.

Um, so now we know that we're looking at each other. You used to go by Betsy? Yes.

And then they came out with the Betsy Wetsy doll. And I put an end to that. Because my brothers, as you might imagine, smart moves.

I can't imagine great grief. Well, thank you for sharing. And I am also grateful for the two way communication.

There's more Jetson style what we get to do. Yeah. And thank you, everybody for joining Schwentzongs Tower to be on this futuristic Jetson style phone call with us.

And who knew that we'd be working like this in our lifetimes? I did not. I didn't know 10 years ago.

Yeah, totally. So it's very exciting and odd times we're living in. And looking forward to class together.

It's a blessing that we can do this with people and friends from all over the world. I love it. We created some good stuff here.

And I wonder what we're going to create next. Let's see what Kadrip J has to say about it. Yeah.

So, you know, we've been going on in this tech sort of, you know, feeling our way through the weeds. At least it feels that way for me. And we've been, gosh, about three months on our own.

And I thought that maybe it would be a good idea if we went back to where we last were, when we were last with Geshe Michael. So we can prepare for our next class with him on this text, which will be coming up soon. So hopefully you all concur.

I'm with you. I think it's a good idea. Because we could continue to try and, you know, thrash through the weeds.

And that actually may be more fun than what I'm about to suggest. But anyway. Okay.

So let me, I'm sorry, I've got like about 3,000 windows open. And I'm afraid my computer will be very unhappy with me if I don't close some of these things. So we're going to go back to the time when, as you recall, we have this list of texts that are purported to be by Arya Nagarjuna.

And among those texts that K.J. mentioned was a text called Nothing to Fear. And he starts pulling apart, or he starts raising issues that may mean that it's really not by Arya Nagarjuna, as some think it to be. One was that he quoted one of his students in this commentary to A Text on Wisdom, which, well, my teachers, I don't know if he's quoted me ever, but it's not normal.

[Speaker 3]
Yes, actually.

[Speaker 1]
Yes. Oh, gosh. Well, only, yeah, probably because I had to go in with my Mickey Mouse ears.

[Speaker 3]
That might be upcoming.

[Speaker 1]
So, let's see, he's quoted you. He's super proud of your take on the situation where, you know, from Nagarjuna's wisdom, you know, the famous verse where he, where Nagarjuna says that things aren't, things don't exist, you know, from their, or that Master Bhavavika added from their own side to what Nagarjuna said. And you have some take on it that he was very proud of, and he still quotes it.

There is that time. Yeah. Let's see if I can find a copy of the text that I haven't written all over.

Things don't come from themselves. Things don't come from something else. Things don't come from both.

Things don't come from neither. Right. And then I'm just killing time while you search.

Master Bhavavika added things don't come from something else from their own side, because in a way, things do come from something else. Things appear to come from something else. Yeah, that's the way that we experience the world.

Yeah. And had he, had Bhavavika said that, I would not have had a problem. But I did have a problem.

Okay, speaking of which, that's where we were in the text. That's about where I would like us to go back to. Hold on.

Now Zoom is not going to like that I have all these things open. Because when I go to share a Word document, it's going to say which of the 45 Word documents that you have open is it that you want to share? The eternal Zoom screen sharing plight.

I know that well. Yeah. Okay, my apologies.

My apologies. Me apologizing. Okay.

Well, I'm just on the screen. So I can't stop myself from talking. No, that please feel free to not stop yourself.

All right. Let's see if it lets me share the one that's on top. If you know where the document is, you can just share desktop and then you can just scroll to it.

Looks like you Oh, I don't want to do share desktop because you don't want to see my desktop. Okay, here we go. I would I don't want you to see my desktop.

That's fine. Because I've been trying to be neat, you know, and I'm doing pretty well out here in the physical world. But here in the digital world, things tend to be still a bit of a mess.

Your bookcase looks fantastic. Oh, thank you. And thank let's see who do we have to think?

We have to think Gibson and his lovely wife and mark for helping me put it together and venerable chunsam for helping me fill it. You've got a good crew that's got your back. I know.

Okay, so here we are. Um, we're actually do we want to go up one more? Okay, we're gonna bring up one more.

So he came to J. For those just joining us is writing this book about about selflessness, or things being empty of having a nature of their own. And this is important, because this is what we need to see if we want to get out of the circle of suffering.

The first thing we have to think about, other than who's appropriate to hear these teachings, and so on and so forth, which is just someone who's got an open mind and doesn't have a mind filled with their own wrong ideas is, well, which of the Buddhist words do we take as being definitive, because the Buddha spoke about this lack of a self nature to things in different ways. So the first whole part of the book that we've gone through has been from the perspective of the mind only school. Our main charioteers, there are Arya Asanga, and Master Vasubandhu.

And we went through for some time, about what the mind only schools perspective is about what it means to say that things don't have their own self nature. Now we're going on to our next charioteer, perhaps the ultimate charioteer, Arya Nagarjuna. And what he presents as the definitive meaning of what the Buddha meant when he said that things don't have a nature of their own.

So we're at the beginning part of this section. And we're just sort of laying the groundwork for substantiating going to Arya Nagarjuna as an authority on this topic. And we have talked about him having been prophesied by the Buddha and others, long before his birth.

And we've talked about the books that he wrote, we've talked about other scholars who have commented on his works, a great number of them. And now we're in this section of well, like, what about this one book, this one book called Nothing to Fear. Is that really by Arya Nagarjuna?

Was that Arya Nagarjuna commenting himself on his own text, through text on wisdom? And K.J. before this verse here on the screen, had just said, you know, even though there's someone, some person that I'm not familiar with who this person is, but he said, his name is Avalokita Vrata. He claimed that Nothing to Fear was indeed a commentary, an auto commentary written by Arya Nagarjuna on root text on this.

So now, then he says, but, you know, there are some inconsistencies with Nothing to Fear, between Nothing to Fear and commentaries written by such renowned scholars as Buddhapadita Chandrakirti and Bhavaviveka. K.J. goes so far as to say that those three should have pointed out that Arya Nagarjuna was being inconsistent in what he said in root text on wisdom and what he purportedly said in Nothing to Fear. Okay.

So now we're diving more deeply into that. If you recall, was everybody here when we went through this before? Every single one of us.

Probably. Okay. If you weren't, if you weren't there, well, if you were there, I'm sorry, we're going through it again.

If you weren't there, I'm sorry, then I probably won't do it the same level of justice as K.J. Michael did, but nonetheless, here we go. So, Kavin, would you like to please read this section here? Yes, I'd love to.

Thank you for asking. Beautiful. Thank you so much.

Okay. So, Parinath, do you know Parinath? For example, japa der, that means in that commentary.

Japa is commentary. Der, in that. So, that's what we're talking about.

Ni just says that's what we're talking about. So, this is like in the in the context of, in the context of, right, during the, in the situation of, or something like that. Is the verses of homage that appear at the beginning of every Buddhist text, not in French, mind you, but in the other languages in which they were normally written.

Okay. So, in, in the, in the verses of homage, there's, there's a quote. And we know it's a quote because it says she.

That means we're quoting something. The, that which appears before the she is a quote. And here's the quote.

So, let's just break this down. I'm sorry? Nothing stops.

There is no stopping. Yeah. Because.

There is no. Nothing started in the first place. Yeah.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
How can something stop if it never started? It's got a very good point. Yeah, that's a very good point.

Okay. Okay. So, they talk Drupala.

So, then to prove that, to prove that claim that there's no stopping because there's no arising, there's another quote. And this happens to be from, from the root text on wisdom. So, we can say that this quote here, what we're talking about, what we're quoting from is this text, nothing to fear.

That's K.J. doesn't know, at least he has not said who he thinks wrote, wrote it. But it is purported by some to be by Ari Nagarjuna. And K.J. is trying to again show that it is, it couldn't have been written by Ari Nagarjuna, or maybe that it would be, dare I say, blasphemy to suggest that it was written by Ari Nagarjuna. Okay. So, to prove that this book, nothing to fear, made this quotation here, and it pulled another quotation from root text on wisdom to substantiate it. And that's this quote here, which no doubt, our dear friend, Mr. Lashaw probably translated this in a much more beautiful way. Um, but until I find that exact thing, I don't think I, I mean, I didn't work specifically on the root text. Oh, okay. Okay.

Yeah. But I mean, that may, that quotation may have come up in something I've worked on, but it's kind of just, just as likely that it's come up in what you're working on. So as, as we can see, it's more likely.

So it ends, actually, this should be down here, and this should be up there. There we go. That's better.

Maybe, but maybe not. I'll look at that again. Okay.

But it ends with, so cheer, because because, uh, things, now let's see, I broke it up differently. I translated all of this as because things wherever or whatever, uh, never arise from self or from other. Here's the self from self, not from self, not from other, uh, from both me, uh, or without a cause, you may.

Also, here's the, because things, and this is like, uh, whatever or wherever, uh, they do, they never ever arise from self, from other, from both, or without a cause. Okay. That, that sounds cool.

I like it. That makes sense, right? Well, maybe if you're already into the middle way, it totally makes sense.

Might require further explanation for the average listener or, or me, but, um, but it's a familiar for me. Right. Well, we aren't, we're going, this next stanza is where it starts to get a little, uh, more interesting and hopefully a little more going in a little, a little more depth into what this is talking about.

Um, let's see. I can't see people, so I don't know who to ask. Um, would someone like to volunteer to read in our, or in his translating?

I volunteer Kim Chi to read. Okay.

[Speaker 3]
Kim Chi, please. Yeah. Hello teacher.

[Speaker 2]
Hello. Yeah. Okay.

Yes.

[Speaker 1]
Nick. Lovely. Thank you so much.

Okay. They talk super long. Uh, this, the proof, the, the, this reasoning that is proving something.

Uh, to prove that reason. Yeah. I think he's just referring to the earlier day.

Yeah. Um, actually we're, we're going on here. Yeah.

This is it's proved in what comes next. I think. Yeah.

So here we've got, we've got a Shay here. So that is my indicator that what comes before it is, is something that has been, uh, quoted. Yeah.

Okay. Um, so this nopal Nam Ki Ram Shinni, uh, nopal Nam. So that's things.

Yeah. And we took this to mean in class, all things, uh, wrong shin. Uh, that's a self nature.

Yeah. Right. So it could just be nature too.

Yeah. Their self nature, their nature. So something about the self nature of all things.

It doesn't exist. It doesn't exist in a silk. And, um, when we talk about a chin, which can have different meanings in, in, you know, depending on the context here, when we're talking about, uh, cause and effect, which we are talking about, right.

The last verse was talking about, oh, things don't come from self from other, from both or without a cause. So we're talking about, uh, we're talking about cause and effect. So in that case can, that means a condition, causal condition.

And when we get to the next verse, we're going to go into those or do we do no, we, uh, we go into it here. Sorry. Uh, we start to go into it here.

Excuse me. So that the true nature of all things does not exist in their causal conditions and such. Okay.

And what is it doing? What is this quotation doing? That's what this little saw is indicating about this quote is doing something.

What it's doing is it's proving that there is no arising from self.

[Speaker 3]
Yeah. Nothing starts on its own. Same.

Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
Right. No, not the same. No, that's not what I'm saying.

Nothing starts on its own. No arising from self, uh, not born from self. Yeah.

That's, that's what it means. I think. Uh, and then we have this.

[Speaker 3]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
So this could either be just disjunctive or not. It could just be conjunctive. So what's next here is ducking.

Wait a minute. I already did that in the, no, it just looks like what we did before. If, if there is no, uh, self existence to things, um, there is no other existence.

Thanks. This is also a quote. Here's the shape that I was looking for.

So this is also, these two lines here are also a quotation from wisdom.

[Speaker 3]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
That law seems to be like such that if things possess no self, then, um, they don't possess something. Otherwise. All right.

Take it easy. We're just trying to get the right translation over here. Okay.

And then because this shape, uh, which indicates the quote also ends in a saw, uh, cater today is telling us it's doing something. What is it doing? Uh, it's proving that there's no arising from other Shen is other K is a rising May part.

There is no, and this is to prove those thoughts can just be like a, therefore to therefore this proves blah, blah, blah.

[Speaker 3]
It could be yeah.

[Speaker 1]
Ching is, uh, and okay. They need, uh, these two need is to, and they is referring to these two quotations we just had. Uh, and these are explained as proving that there is no, uh, arising from both.

Yeah. As well. So these two are explained as proving there is as well, no rising from both, both what no rising from self, no rising from something else and no rising from both together.

Hmm. I think it's both together, both yourself and, and both from others. Yes.

From themselves, others or both. Right. Yeah.

I'm just explaining what both means. Yeah. Okay.

How are we doing? Good. Okay.

Good. I saw a note here about, don't forget to mute yourself. And I thought, Oh boy, things are not going well.

If someone's asking me to mute myself, just kidding, Kentaro, just kidding. Okay. Let's, let's go on.

Now it starts to get really sort of interesting or it's to be more interesting. Oh, I just want to interject at this point because Geshe Michael did. Uh, he said, uh, the idea that things don't grow from something else is a little difficult, right?

To say that a tree doesn't grow from a seed that, that goes against our experience. Right. It's, it's challenging to say that things don't come from something else.

Um, it, it's, it's easy to say that things don't come from themselves, right? Because you'd have to be there before you created yourself and that doesn't happen. Right.

So, uh, but then there's this thing, which we're going to go more deeply into, but these lines are also saying that things don't come from something else. And what do these philosophers mean when they say this? Because we see this, um, we see this a lot.

Uh, when we see the lines, things don't come from something else. Geshe Michael suggested that we think of it as meaning that things don't come from something else that it never touches. So if you think about, uh, a seed for a tree, just to be clear, and a tree, if we, if we think about, uh, the seed that you plant to grow a particular tree, that particular tree and that seed that you plant, they never touch.

If the seed is there, there's no tree yet. If the tree is there, the seed is already gone. So he suggests that we think about, uh, when we say that things don't come from something else, that we think of it in terms of, uh, two things that touch.

Um, and if you've been going to Adam's classes, um, I mean, I think we talked about for things to have a relationship with each other, like they have to, they have to both be existing things, right? The seed is, is already gone. So it, it no longer exists when the tree exists, the tree doesn't yet exist if the seed exists.

So there's no two existing things there to have a relationship. So, uh, and if we say, well, this is all very scholarly and, uh, you know, why I think about things in such detail, it's because if we say that something could be caused by something it never touched, that means that that thing could be caused by anything it ever, never touched. Right.

I guess you, Michael said in class, if, if trees, if trees come from seeds, then trees could come from toilet bowls because seeds don't touch trees and toilet bowls don't touch trees. Well, usually they're using it as a planter, which I've seen some people do, but anyway, right. So there's a, there's a whole universe of things that are different from tree and tree could have been caused by, uh, any of them.

If we say that things can come from something other than it, we're saying that things can come from anything other than it. Um, okay. Did we go through this whole thing?

No, no, no, we didn't. Oh, we didn't go to this next one. Oh, sorry.

Right. Okay. Here now, now it gets really, uh, interesting.

Uh, let's see, is like, oh, participants. I can see participants. Let's see.

Please read this. Yes. Great.

Thank you. Beautiful. Thank you so much.

Okay. So, do you remember what that means? The day again is referring to, uh, nothing to fear.

And it's, you know, immediately talking about these quotations and how it's presenting them, right? So the argument to refute that argument, right. So it's presenting, um, arguments that, uh, against someone else's argument.

That's what Geshe Michael said that it's probably doing. Um, let's see here. And, oh, my computer, my confusers getting computed.

My computer is getting confused. That's interesting. Isn't the tip of the usually the part of the text where we refute others' arguments.

Yeah. I think that's how it's used in a logic text and then, or in any dialectic text written in that format. And then this is just against our arguments too.

I think it's just literal here, Nick argument that refutes that argument, um, argument. Yeah. The argument for refuting that argument.

Um, about that is, um, uh, Ken Nam, she for, for contributing factors or cause of, uh, causal conditions, right. The four causal conditions and, um, Hey, those are cute. Those are, those are causes and, and then dot, dot, dot.

Yep. Dot, dot, dot. Um, so we've got, there are four causal conditions.

Uh, the first one's causal and dot, dot, dot. What's it? Oh, no, actually this is, uh, again, we're going to see here in a second.

It's actually from, uh, root text on wisdom. It's actually right here. It's the end of the line.

Okay. I thought it was a separate after the thing. Thank you.

Yeah. So, so what KJJ is doing here, if we could just sort of like break down this paragraph for how we can look at it, I find it helpful to do that. First of all, um, these are the four Ken's from Avidan.

Um, they are, yes. Yes. Uh, but the quotation is from wisdom.

Yeah. So I like to first go through and identify like, okay. Uh, especially when I see this, come back.

She, uh, which means, what does that mean? Dodo versus the, yeah, the four lines, four lines. So it's, it's starting with this and then continuing on, right.

The four lines that start here and dot, dot, dot the rest that follow to make four, uh, and this, so that kind of breaks this off into one little, and I'm just going to color it just for the heck of it. Uh, this just breaks this off here. Then we've got another, so, okay.

So now we've got the first two lines and they must start here.

[Speaker 3]
After the Lendu.

[Speaker 1]
Change this one. I'm sorry. Yeah.

My, my cursor tends to have a mind of its own. Sorry. Okay.

So we've got this quote here that is apparently the first line of four, right? And then that is, uh, they Lendu that's, that's in response to that's answering, or we could say, and to answer that, then we go next to which, what are apparently the first two lines of verses that start with Je wa ken dang denpa me. Je wa ken dang denpa me.

Excuse me. Isn't, isn't, isn't these two lines an answer to the previous statement, the previous verse? Uh, yeah, they Lendu.

So, uh, oh, what, I'm sorry. Say that again. The, the, the first two lines of this verse are a response to the four lines of the previous verse that's quoted.

Okay. So we've got two verses here. Let's just pull them out together.

So we can look at these. Verse and a half. Uh, well, I think what we need to do is look at the whole verses because of the tsok.

We need to know, uh, what the rest of it says, I think.

[Speaker 3]
He's saying tsok because it's only the first line. He's saying this is the first line, but it's the first two lines that I'm referring to that are a response to the four lines of that verse that starts with ken nam shi te gyur dang yi.

[Speaker 1]
Okay. Then let's just pull out those, just the first two lines. Yeah.

The first two lines of that verse are, um, uh, where it gets a little bit confusing because, um, this is, uh, nothing to fear. The commentary, the supposed, the commentary supposedly written by Arya Nagarjuna says one thing and the root text on wisdom says something else. But when I went to search, remember Geshe Michael talked about that we have a second edition of the 10 year that has been inputted into Roman characters, which makes it searchable for us.

Um, it introduced a new little problem into the mix because the two, the two texts, root texts on wisdom, the one in Nartan and, and the other one that we've had before, they do not match. But the next two lines are, hold on. So we've got these four lines here and I'm just going to sneak this in here.

If my computer, uh, participates, there we go. Um, and I'm going to put that, that, that, because there's, there are words that come in between. We, we have the Nartan data too.

I'm sorry. You have the Nartan data too. Yeah.

Cool. I want to see it. Yeah.

It's up in the Dropbox. Yeah. It's in the database.

It's not split yet. Like the way that, no, I mean for here, I did, I mean the, the stuff that didn't match, I was curious what didn't match. Oh, so what didn't match and I'm sorry, but I could not figure out how to, um, share my.

It's okay. I'm just curious. Just cause you mentioned.

Um, my laptop is faster than my computer. Well, I'm sorry. It's taking too long.

So let me just say that here, um, in, in the, the version of the Tangier that is in the ALL database has, has a positive statement. Jawah ken dang denpa yin. Um, but here, as you see, uh, the nothing to fear is quoting, uh, root text on wisdom as saying jawah ken dang denpa meh.

Uh, I can tell you that the Nartung version of wisdom does not say jawah ken dang denpa meh.

[Speaker 3]
What's it say?

[Speaker 1]
However, uh, it, it does say a negative. It uses like my yin or something. Oh, min.

Okay. Not min, but I think my yin, but anyway. My yin.

The Chinese translation, the old Chinese translation is also a negation. Okay. Okay, cool.

So we can, so what that means is like, when we first were looking at this, well, if, if we just go on for the rest of this text, it's basically saying there's a problem. Uh, there's a problem in nothing to fear that the three commentators, Buddha Palida, Baba Viveka and Chandra Kirti didn't call out Arya Nagarjuna about. So the problem is we can eliminate from the list of possible problems.

The fact that the root text on wisdom says a positive statement, whereas nothing to fear states has a negative statement. Okay. So we can, we can just cross that off the list.

It's there's some other problem going on, uh, in this particular, there's some other problem that KJJ is trying to bring to our attention as, as, as proving that this wasn't written by Arya Nagarjuna. Okay. So, so now we know it's not this.

So here are, here are the, the, the four lines. And this here is saying in answer to that. So in answer to those four lines are these next two lines.

And let's just go ahead and pull it from, uh, nothing to fear because it is more accurate because it says actually this. So you can see the only difference here is this, right? So what does actions don't have causes?

Is it actions or things here? Um, we were talking about actions in class. Hmm.

Okay. So don't have causal conditions. There is, there is no causal condition that doesn't possess an action, isn't it?

That there, there is no action that doesn't, that doesn't have a condition. We've got it backwards. I mean, here we're talking about chalice, right here.

We're talking about kints, right? But the can done me then doesn't have. So there is no condition that doesn't have an action.

Right. There is no, there is no kin done me. Then it means that doesn't have, or does it possess, right?

No, I don't think so. Um, there, there's, there's no, there's, there's no action, which doesn't have a condition. Because of the grammar.

No, that's what this is. Not, I know what you're saying. There's, actions don't possess causal conditions.

Yeah, actions don't possess conditions. And there, there, there is no action. Um, that is, that does not possess a condition.

Yeah, I don't see how that could possibly be. That's what it says. Chalice me.

Yeah, there's something weird with the grammar there. Because they, if they put chalice after me done, it doesn't make sense the other way. Yeah, I don't think so.

But I understand the problem. Well, if you talk about the cause and effect relationship, we talk about that causes have results. Results have causes.

So actions have no causes. So action here is standing in for results. Is it not?

We could say that action is a result when we say there is no cause. Well, no, we're not necessarily. Not necessarily.

Yeah, it could be something like that. There, there's, there does not possess a condition which like produces an action. Yeah, that's what I was just gonna say.

I think it's something like there isn't. I mean, it's supposed to be the reverse of the first line. It's supposed to be like, or it's actions don't have causes and, and conditions don't create actions or something like that.

Yeah, or it's just emphasizing it. Maybe like actions don't have causes. There is no action.

Oh, no. There's no action at all that possesses a condition. Yeah, that's what I mean.

There is no, there is no single action. Like there's not, or there's no action that exists. I mean, here's why I'm sort of like a little, here's the next two lines, just so we know.

Okay. Yes, please. Okay.

Even though he's not talking about them in this verse. Uh-oh, he gets apologies. Sorry to be saying what, what, what you wanted to just say, right?

Did I do, did I copy that correctly? Uh-huh. There's no action, which is.

Actions don't, actions are not bereft of possessing causal conditions. All right, because the my in, you're using it twice though, aren't you? Me then, my in, there are two negatives.

Yeah, I know, but I don't know, I don't know. Actions don't not possess causal conditions. Nevertheless, actions do possess them.

I think it's saying. Or possess something. I'm sorry.

Yeah, but the last part is even though. Yeah. Could be.

Yeah, even though they do, even though, even though things happen. I think the last thing is saying, yeah, there are no actions that have any condition, but things still happen. There's still actions that are.

There are actions that possess. Yeah, I don't think you can say that, but I mean, it is literal. It does literally say that, but I don't think that's how you could translate it.

It wouldn't, I don't think it would make sense to anybody. Well, I mean. It's often been explained to us that Arya Nagarjuna writes in a way that, you know.

You need a commentary in order to understand what it is that he's saying.

[Speaker 3]
For sure.

[Speaker 1]
We need to be able to go to Chandrakirti, for example, to understand what he means by that. But, you know, we're out of time. So anyway, my task, just to sort of wrap up this part, was to try and find.

Try and find the verses. In the, in the Natang. That would relate.

So, I mean, I've gone and done that. I haven't seen them all because my computer gets very unhappy when I try and search the database. So, I apologize for not being able to show that to you, but.

I have, I think, reported that which I found. So, you can, you can anticipate in, I think, gosh, it's only in a week's time. That my next class with Geshe Michael, I believe, is in about a week.

And you can guess that there are going to be questions drawn from this material. So, that was my primary goal in bringing y'all sort of up to speed on what it was we talked about three months ago, or remind you what we talked about three months ago. Yeah, I think it's helpful.

I mean, it's going to make for some interesting discussion with Geshe Michael. Sorry guys, why am I pinned? I didn't.

Just hold really still. We'll just think.

[Speaker 2]
Oh, why are you pinned?

[Speaker 1]
Probably because, you know, someone thinks you're cute. You must have an admirer here somewhere. The only explanation.

Okay, so, real-life applications of what we just talked about over the past hour. I mean, it's not fair for me because my real-life occupation is trying to research these things, just the way that I showed to you. And I haven't yet stopped to think about why.

What is the lesson here, Geshe Michael, about why I'm doing this? No, I know why I'm doing it. So, we can be very clear about what it was that Arya Nagarjuna said, and what it was that K.J.P.J. said, and Chandrakirti, and Bhavaviveka, and Puravidita. So, we can understand what K.J.P.J. is trying to tell us, and why that's important. If K.J.P.J.'s argument bears out, and we finally get to a point where we can see what he's saying, and then we then agree with him, ah, the three major commentators on Arya Nagarjuna's work. And this book that is only purported to have been written by Arya Nagarjuna says something different, that these three renowned commentators, heavily relied upon commentators, of Arya Nagarjuna's work, that we would give preference to their interpretation of what it was that Arya Nagarjuna meant when he wrote those words.

Which I can anticipate that, hopefully, our New Year's present will be that we actually get into the Middle Way philosophy as presented by Arya Nagarjuna, that will be finished with the preface part of this section of his book. But maybe it's about, you know, investigate. Don't just take on, don't just accept any old thing you see.

Investigate and see if, does it make sense internally? Does it fit within what is professed or taught by people that you consider to be expert in the field, that you value as being forthright? Which fits very much into the subject of this book in terms of what is literal and what is figurative when the Buddha talked about emptiness.

That's what I got. Anyone else got something fun or not fun, sad, glad, joyous? I mean, along the lines of what you were saying, I know practical application of the words specifically come to my mind, but other than how we can act differently if we understand emptiness.

But that's not anything specific to this passage of text. But something that I find really interesting is thinking about how Nagarjuna and the works that are derived from his work, sometimes like talk in a way where even piecing it out logically doesn't necessarily help you as much as just letting it have some kind of effect upon your mind and hopefully sending you spinning in circles in a way that opens your mind to deeper concepts than you could quite comprehend with your limited logical or my limited logical capacity. Now, I think that's what Zen koans are all about and such. But I don't know, maybe in terms of practical applications, maybe there's something to be said for those of us who are students of philosophy to try to, and this is what Geshe Michael in a way suggests about watching Mixed Nuts in a way, sometimes, let the information permeate you.

You don't necessarily have to be able to understand it, but it's still having an effect on your consciousness and on your mind over the long haul. And I think that that can mean a few different things. On the one hand, there are things that we could certainly understand logically that were just not there because we didn't necessarily build the framework for it.

And then there's stuff that I think, especially things that Nagarjuna said that are just designed to mess with you in a way that help open you up to seeing things differently. And I studied math and engineering in college and I used to get stuck in a problem and I couldn't get past a certain point. And then I would just have to walk away and look at it with fresh eyes later and something completely different would occur to me.

I just had to bring a whole new frame of mind to it. It wasn't something I was able to figure out in the way that I thought I could. And so a practical application is sometimes realize that you're not going to figure it out in the way that you thought you could.

Try to be open-minded in a way that you don't even understand yet. Yeah. And also we should keep in mind that basically we spent three months on about one page of Ketubji's book.

So there are a few more pages after this that are going to, I think, reveal to us what's going on. Which we could do with a book that's already in a language we understand, right? If something doesn't quite seem to make sense, if we go on, then there might be something that does make sense.

So we can go back and see, oh, how does that work with where I was confused before? Is that clear to that point up? I don't know.

I just watched the last Mission Impossible movie and I just had to leave many things behind that I was never able to put together. Uh-oh. So should I rent it or not?

That's great. Yeah. If you're in the mood for some action.

I might be after this. Anyone else have some, anything? We've got four minutes to talk about practical applications.

Practical applications. Of dharma in general. I'm sorry, go ahead.

Hi, Nick. I just want to say something that you just said. You just nailed it in a way, meaning that it's like the fact that you're not completely understanding what Nagarjuna is really saying is really opening up your mind to see things differently around you.

And that's what makes you be able to open yourself to having emptiness in your mind all the time, right? So I think that for me, what you said really nailed it, because the practical application is really to remind you that everything that you're seeing right now, including this call and the device in which the call is in and the chair that I'm sitting in, is not really as I am perceiving it. This is something else.

And then just playing with your mind and having that dialogue in the back of your mind, I actually believe there's nothing more helpful than that in your way to being able to remind you of emptiness continually, right? So that's a very deep practical application, I think, because that's the essence of why we're on this path. So thanks for sharing that.

That was pretty cool. It's also helpful in our relationships with other people. Totally.

But I mean, what really stuck me is that right now, I'm by myself in this room. So I didn't even have the possibility of practicing what we know of our reactions towards others. I mean, as my practice grows, I think personally, I'm a little bit more wired to be sensible to my reactions towards others, and being aware that what I'm perceiving coming from them, where is it really coming from, right?

But then sitting in a place where you're by yourself, and you're surrounded by objects. And then how your perception is conditioned to see those objects, and even the sensation of being in this place like that. And how can it be enhanced by what you just said?

I mean, even the objects themselves, right? We're really wired to the other husband in the kitchen, right? But what about the other kitchen in the kitchen, right?

Oh, anyway, there was one. Thanks. Yeah, the other computer on my desk, the one that works very quickly.

So nice.

[Speaker 3]
Wow. Hi.

[Speaker 1]
What a lucky dad. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry.

I just noticed you had your hand up. But we have come to the end of our discussion of how to use this in day-to-day life. We got to turn it over to Mr. Hosso. We got to turn it over to Mr. Hosso. Thank you, everyone. Please, even though confused, dedicate this energy of how we spent the past hour and some minutes, if we haven't already realizing the nature of reality directly.

Thank you. Thank you. There he is with his bell.

It looks like it's floating magically. Yeah. Look, they say this is a secret.

If you cannot fix it, you should feature it. It's floating in a can. It can be just there, perfectly fit.

You'll never tell. That pichiquín is flying in a mixed green. Beans, no salt added.

Vegetable can. Okay. So thank you very much for them.

Of course, time to prepare these classes and then share with us today, especially with Bala and in general, all of you translators who work hard to keep learning and then to share with other people. Thank you so much. And of course, thank you to people who come and spend the time learning and chewing on this wonderful ancient wisdom.

For that, I would like to start a PPT. So people that are watching online can maybe, just maybe, if it's their first time here, which I really doubt, but who knows? Never knows.

A reminder that these sessions happen every week. And in Asia time, they happen Tuesday mornings. Asia, this should be Tuesday morning right now.

Here in Arizona is Monday evening. And then it happens again on Saturdays. Saturdays in Asia, it's nighttime around 10, 11, midnight, depending what country in Asia you are.

And here in Arizona, it's Saturday time. So what happens is that we get together, usually with Geshe Michael. He guides us how to translate this wonderful text, while we also learn the philosophy on them.

So it's kind of simultaneous. We learn language and we learn content. So I'm leaving here the QR code for the future, or in case people watch later, they can follow the QR codes.

And a reminder that then what Geshe Michael and amazing translation team does is they publish books. They translate them, they print them. And if you want to get some of them, a wonderful way to do it, yes, is joining the Good Night Book Club, where you will be getting, depending on the level you sign up for, to subscribe, different volumes of books during the year.

I think the first level, you get two or three books a year. And along with your, um, how you call it, not suitcase, but book, no, not bookcase, the Balisse, the Good Night Balisse bag, along with the big bag, that's where you put the Balisse in. And also for those of you who may be now already part of the Good Night Book Club, a reminder that you can also sign up for the daily mailing list that Geshe-la shares with us every day, pretty much every day.

He, with all the progress he does in his personal translation time, usually on mornings, then he shares the text, the progress that he has done on the translation, and also some general news that are happening in general in the, along the world, Worldview Network. And an example of that I find fun, it's the email he sent yesterday. It's the next one, for example, right now he's working with the Devil Debates the Angel, the Angel Debates the Devil.

And then he was telling us about this discussion they are having, where the angel is telling the devil that, come on man, you are like really confused. You are like the man who has 50 donkeys. And then one day, because he's distracted, it's walking around riding a donkey and can only find 49 donkeys.

And then the man is so worried, you know, looking everywhere, where is my last donkey? I don't find my last donkey, donkey number 50. And not knowing that the one that he's riding is actually the one that he's looking for.

So anyways, and then Gisela shares a little bit that, if you can look at the bottom of the screen, that the point here, she says, is that the development of wisdom in our minds must be careful and purposeful. Just waiting for a luck wisdom moment is not going to be enough to stop millions of years of mistaken perceptual habits. We need to commit ourselves to the task of mastering wisdom and give it a good block of time every day through study and meditation.

So if you like these kind of things and many more, Gisela shares on and on, on almost basically daily basis. And that's what you get if you sign up. That and more is what you get on the daily mailing list.

Okay. Talk to your the DCC person of trust worthy person. I don't know if Spanish makes sense.

Okay. Let's keep going. These days Geshe Michael is having the DSU sessions at Dragon's Head.

It's going to be going from the second yesterday to the eighth for a week. That's what's happening. And I think as far as I understand, that's why today we had a team class.

And as far as I understand, we will have team class again on Saturday, but Monday. Is that the case? I see Nick a little.

If it is, then I don't think I knew that yet, but let me check. Okay. It's just rumors, but you know, here in the news, sometimes we talk about rumors.

We will confirm with you soon and type in the chat. Okay. And along with these, just so you know, in the others, other part of the world, YSI, along with Maria and Maria Mortel and Peter Mortel and their yoga organization called Pink Diamond are in the middle of the Lady Niguma tree.

Level three is one of the first times that this level is being taught soon. We hope we can get more news about it. It's happening starting two days ago.

It will go all the week till November 7th on Turkey, Antalya. Let's see how it goes. Best wishes over there.

Yes. Now, this upcoming Friday, our friend Gail Deutsch is going to be continuing with a series of Blue Sky Friends. This time is called Good Life Beyond Death Part Two.

It's happening morning time. November 7th is Friday, this upcoming Friday. Usually the sessions last about an hour.

And yeah, just encouraging people to check. And I keep saying like the times that I've been able to join, the content is really, really great. So they have a sessions every other week.

This is one of those weeks where they do have sessions on for sessions. And if you haven't been able to, thank you, Marina. If you haven't been able to join the live sessions, you can find the recordings on their new YouTube channel.

So watch whenever is a good time for you. Okay. Now we still have good time before our next translation session.

And I wanted to show you a little bit of what happened last week. Next picture, please. Where, as you may remember, we had this event in Phoenix, along with the simultaneous event happening in Malaysia.

So this big event was produced. One of the main producers was Jasmine Zhao, and she invited some teachers from the United States to be part of the whole event over there. They prepared some videos.

What I did is I grabbed a few of some of them and put them together. So you get a little taste of what it was like. And then we have one of those teachers here with us to share a little bit of how was the experience before we move on onto news about the next event Five Houses is producing.

So Marina, if you could kindly help us with the video. Okay. Yeah.

So it looks like it was very fun. And yeah, Nick had the chance to go. I was hoping he will tell us a little bit of this new modern way of doing the fire system, but with how do you call those paper machines?

That's actually very creative. I think it's fun. Yeah.

I mean, as you probably all figured out, we were in a hotel that you couldn't really have a fire. We were in the middle of the city. So instead of burning the bad deeds written down, we shredded them.

So usually back at home in California, I'm shredding waves, but in Kuala Lumpur, I'm shredding bad deeds. That's amazing. And what was the balloons about?

That was, I'm trying to remember. Yeah, I guess that was at the end of that four powers party. It's all kind of a blur.

I feel like you guys having just seen that video, remember about as much as I do because of the jet lag. I think we were smashing the bad deeds also.

[Speaker 3]
Really cool.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. We did the four powers and then we did a four steps like rejoicing. So then we did Jasmine had a bunch of balloons and we just kind of partied, you know, with smashing the balloons.

Now, some other amazing thing is that we just had this event and super, super soon is coming up. The Kyoto is like pretty much in a month from now. We have the next five houses event for that today.

Alejandro is with us and she's going to tell us a little bit of what to expect if we want to get ready and participate on that. I have to say one thing. Tell me.

Just to make sure that if everything is according to what I understand now, Geshe Michael will be joining us for Sean Song's Tower on Saturday. He's going to be guiding Xiaoping in her text, probably live from Dragon's Head. Awesome.

Okay. Great news. Yes.

I hear we were having only one session, but that's two sessions during DSU. Great. Just okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. I think, I mean, that's what I just heard.

[Speaker 3]
So awesome.

[Speaker 1]
Okay. Let's hear from Ale if Tech Table can help us. What are the surprises and excitements to wait for the upcoming event?

[Speaker 2]
Hi, everyone. Yes, we are ready to go to Kyoto in a couple of weeks, and I am very excited to share that we will have a special classes with Ben Kramer. We will have debate classes also with Kendra, and then we will have special ceremonies.

Some of them will be with Geshe Michael. So we are looking forward to have a special event with all of you. We will be in person or online.

We hope that you can join us and celebrate also Geshe Michael's birthday, debate classes, ceremonies, master classes for the five houses, meditation, yoga, and much, much more. Please join us and come. It will be an amazing opportunity to close the year together.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. I hear Ale that if people need, there's like special payment plans they can take.

[Speaker 2]
Yes.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. Don't be shy. Just talk to Ale, talk to Tim, talk to Sarah.

[Speaker 2]
Yes. The doors are open for everyone who needed, and we have monthly payments. We have a special prices.

We have a scholarships available. The idea is to have as much as people as we can in that event. We can have up to 500 people or more if it's needed.

So please come reach out to us if you need a special price and we will make it happen for all of you.

[Speaker 1]
Wonderful. Hopefully soon we can have Ben Kramer telling us about what he's planning for the in-life in-person event. And then I want to hear more about Geshe Michael's birthday celebration.

I hear that and it's interesting. So we'll be talking about it soon again. Hopefully.

Thank you, Ale, so much. And Nick as well. Congratulations for the success in Malaysia.

Let's go next to our next session with Mr. Master Sugeng. Mr. Master.