Сугэн Ши — Книга 2: Колесо жизни (первый принцип и подразделения зависимости), занятие 7

[Speaker 1]
You are reading the poem, my goodness. All right, okay. I'm about to do the, yeah.

Throat is as dry as a bird's or something. This is the third time. What is that?

Anybody remember? Dry. Beside, beside, beside word.

Yes, ancient. An ancient throat. Ancient throat.

Stanley, what controversial idea about the Abhidharmakosha did we learn from Master Vasubandhu in the commentary about the dependence? Referring to the topic for the people in a bigger way. Anybody else.

If you, if you remember.

[Speaker 2]
Is this the one about Lamrim?

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. Yes.

[Speaker 2]
And that is.

[Speaker 1]
Okay.

[Speaker 2]
For Arya truth.

[Speaker 1]
Yes.

[Speaker 2]
All Lamrim, I think.

[Speaker 1]
Yes. Lamrim, yeah. Lamrim.

Referring to the Arya truth. Okay. And another 1% meaning of gift.

[Speaker 3]
So, 1% of the time it means gift.

[Speaker 1]
Yes. Should I put an S here or?

[Speaker 2]
Yes. We can't see. Too many things, too many things open, we can't see your screen.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, really. Oh, sorry. Okay, let me do that.

[Speaker 2]
It was fine. It wasn't the whole thing. It wasn't scrolling.

[Speaker 1]
Okay, okay. Okay, so I have already. Okay, can you see it now.

It's coming. Coming. Okay, hopefully.

What else can I close. Okay, let me stop it again. Oh, gosh.

What else. Okay, let me see. Okay, this one.

Sorry. Sorry. I know it's terrifying.

[Speaker 2]
Have Alina in the area or something.

[Speaker 1]
Mommy's home.

[Speaker 2]
Oh, mommy.

[Speaker 1]
Hey, let me try again. Oh, my God. Oh, was that Gracie.

[Speaker 2]
I told her to bark.

[Speaker 3]
Oh, you did. Yeah, she, she heard Ja Rue and she like, she got out of her bed and started like walking around.

[Speaker 2]
That's so funny. That's kind of cool. Talking from across the.

Can you say hello. Oh, my gosh.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, my gosh. I'm doing the homework now. So.

Can you see my screen now?

[Speaker 2]
It says it's coming.

[Speaker 1]
Still not.

[Speaker 2]
Still not.

[Speaker 1]
I'll get something. Sorry. You want to just read us the question.

Okay. What is the first principle of the dependence and why was it taught. What is the first principle.

[Speaker 3]
Things depend on each other.

[Speaker 1]
Yes. If, if this happens, that happens. If this starts, that starts.

And why was it taught. Why was the principle taught. Remember people asking.

People out of some, sir. Yeah. The principle creates nothing but a big powerful of suffering.

[Speaker 3]
Oh, yeah.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, yeah. And what is the Tibet? What is the meaning of was sick?

Was sick.

[Speaker 3]
Can you spell it? One and only.

[Speaker 1]
Yes. Let me put it. Can you spell it please?

[Speaker 3]
It's boss.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, okay. Got it. Got it.

Yeah. Okay. Okay.

Thank you. That's all. Thanks.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you.

[Speaker 1]
Please take the plane. Welcome. That's your whole homework.

I don't believe it. Oh, yeah. I mean, I started with two earlier.

I couldn't even eat one cut say during that time. All right. Share the screen.

Okay. Wow. You got lots of dogs going down there.

Okay. So, we just got finished saying the Buddha wanted to tell us about the huge mountain of suffering that we are facing. Okay.

Then. Oh, yeah. Geshe-la, I forgot to do the mandala.

Okay. Let's do it. Okay.

Yay. So gang, please read these two lines and Timo Thayer is going to check it. Okay, you're going to translate this by yourself.

Why are we teaching this? Yeah, why did Buddha teach this, right? Here's the verb from the last line.

He taught us about this big mountain of suffering, right? Then why did he teach it? Well, because kājīg, this kājīg means some people, okay?

It doesn't mean a lot of people, it doesn't mean a debater, okay? Some people say, if things are dhātme, if things are selfless, no self-nature, if there's no self, then who korwas? Then who will be in the circle?

Yeah, who will go around the wheel of life, okay? Who can circle in saṃsāra if there's no self, okay? Then who circles around in saṃsāra, okay?

Mīśepa. Some people, mīśepa. They don't get it.

They don't understand it at all. Some people tetsal about it. Tetsal.

Have doubt. They have doubt. Doubt, doubt.

And some people lopashepa. Wrong use. Okay, so try to explain to me, Sugeng, there's three levels of problems here.

One guy, mīshepa. Next guy, tetsal. And the last guy, lopashepa.

Wrong use. Yeah. So it gets worse and worse, right?

Some people just don't know about it. Some people doubt about the teaching about it. And some people have a distinctly wrong idea about it, okay?

And Lord Buddha, in this sutra, is trying to selva those three.

[Speaker 3]
Clear away.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, he's trying to clear away those three problems, okay? He's trying to clear... That's why he's teaching, okay?

She, that's why, okay?

[Speaker 2]
All right.

[Speaker 1]
Go ahead. Who's checking you? Stanley.

Ooh. So dark here, okay? The word dark, the word self, that we have a problem about, is the one that we are viewing as a self-nature, okay?

Self means viewing something as having a self-nature. We think the husband in the kitchen is coming from his side, okay? That's what self means.

DANG SRED PA'I NYON PO YIN PA'I PHYIR And we're trying to counteract NYON PO. We're trying to counteract both that viewpoint and the attachment to the star, okay? SRED PA, okay?

NYON PA'I PHYIR That's why the Buddha is teaching this sutra. We can see that, okay? We can see that, okay?

Okay. Who's going to check you for the next one? Utpala, please.

Okay, Utpala. DE LTAR NA DAG MED PAR DUG BSNGAL NYUNG BAR BSTAN PA'I STONG PA NYID DANG NYON PA MED PAR DANG BYAS SU THUN PAR BYAS PA YIN NO Beautiful. Okay, DE LTAR NA DAG MED PAR DUG BSNGAL NYUNG BAR BSTAN PA'I Therefore, in fact, the way that suffering is happening is that it's happening without a self-nature.

It means it's coming from you. It's not coming from yourself. Even the suffering doesn't have a self-nature.

When suffering happens, it's not happening because of suffering. It's not coming at you, it's coming from you. Okay, got it?

DAG MED Therefore, this teaching is STONG PA NYID and MYON PA MED PAR DANG BYAS SU THUN PAR BYAS PA This teaching is meant to match the concept of emptiness and no prayer. Emptiness and no prayer. These are code words.

These are secret words in Buddhism. These are called NAM PAR THAR PA'I DGOS. Who can tell me?

These are the door to... Liberation. These are a concept called the Three Doors to Liberation.

It's a very profound concept. It's a very deep teaching. I went and got you a footnote for it.

If you don't know these three doors well, you have no idea what this line means. I don't know how many other lines there are like that. Don't forget, we have no help.

We are climbing Mount Everest by ourselves again. Okay, please read. I don't know.

I'm like the grandpa. Okay, Chandra please. BYANG SEMS SA DUG PA SA DUG PA BA'I CHU NAM GYIS NGO BO GYUR DRE BU GSUM BSTAN PA'I STONG PA'I NAM PAR THAR PA'I DGOS STONG PA NYID THANG TSE MA MED PA THANG MUN PA MED PA'I NAM THAR DGOS GSUM BSHAD PA'I Good, okay.

This is K. Dukdenpa Dargye, which is your first author, right? So I suppose you have to accept it.

And this is a book he wrote about the Abhisamaya Alankara. And in fact, he wrote a huge commentary, and that's what we study in the monastery. BYANG SEMS SA DUG PA BA'I A Bodhisattva at the Sixth Level.

A Bodhisattva at the Sixth Level. Okay. And Sixth Level Bodhisattva is important because they master in the six of the perfections.

The sixth one, which is what?

[Speaker 2]
Wisdom.

[Speaker 1]
Wisdom, yeah. So most commentaries on the Ten Bodhisattva Levels are about 50% dedicated to the Sixth Level. Including Chandrakirti's Entering the Middle Way, which is structured around the Ten Bodhisattva Levels.

Okay. SA DUG PA BA'I Those Sixth Level Bodhisattvas, they understand... This should be key, by the way.

Okay. They understand that the essence, and the cause, and the result of things, okay? The essence means the present time, present moment essence of things.

And the cause which made them happen. And the result that they will produce are all empty of any self-nature. A Bodhisattva on the Sixth Bodhisattva Level has a special insight into emptiness that relates to ingo, the cause and effect of things.

So that's very interesting for you because you are studying the cause and effect, right? The dependence. So a Bodhisattva who makes special progress in the Perfection of Wisdom, which means they're at the Sixth Level.

By the way, when you see emptiness directly, you just reached the First Level. And to see emptiness directly, maybe once every 500 years in this world. So imagine Sixth Level.

This guy's on the Sixth Level. He sees that the nature of things, meaning in the present moment, and the cause which produced them, and the result that they produced are all three of them empty of any self-nature. Those three understandings respectively have weird names.

Super weird names. Here they are. Number one, the door to liberation called the emptiness door.

The door to liberation called the emptiness door. Got it? What did you see the emptiness of if you go through that door?

No more. Meaning the present, this object in front of you in the present moment is empty. You are understanding that.

SEMS MA MED PA What does that mean? There's no signs. It has no signs.

But it's a code word. If you pass through the door, which is called the door has no sign on it, what did you understand? The cause of the things?

Is empty. That the cause of a thing is empty. That's extremely difficult to understand.

We talked about it in the last few days. To understand that a seed doesn't really cause a tree is very, very difficult. But if you're a sixth level bodhisattva, you went through that door.

Now the third one is easy, right? SMOD PA MED PA What happens at the third door of liberation? No prayer means the results of things are empty.

Good, perfect. That one's easy for me to remember because prayers are for future things, right? When I can't remember what these three are, at least I can remember no prayer means the future result of a thing is empty.

No sign means the thing that came before is empty. And then the door called emptiness is understanding that the thing in the present moment is empty. Those are together called NAM LTAR DGOS SUM.

These are the three doors to freedom. Three doors to freedom. Now, why are we talking about them?

Let's go back to your line. SMOD PA NI and SMOD PA MED PA Yay! Oh, okay.

SMOD PA NI and SMOD PA MED PA Thank you Geshe-la. Now, SMOD PA NI refers to the ... which moment?

Which of the three moments? The door of emptiness, which is the past. No, which is present moment.

Good. And SMOD PA MED PA we remember. It's easy.

The future, yeah. Yeah, so what he's saying is when we talk about why suffering has happened but suffering has not happened from its own side, as in the kitchen, then we really ... that teaching was given in the same way that he gave the teaching about the emptiness of things in the present moment and the emptiness of things in the future.

Okay? And it's all code word. Everything code word.

All right. Don't forget why there's no past one. Yeah, that's right.

Why there's no past one? Now, I always tell people you have to write a letter to Lord Buddha, okay? Okay.

When I don't know, I always ... I'm also wondering why. And I'm wondering if it's hidden somewhere else here, but I don't think it is.

Okay? Maybe the point is we're trying ... the purpose of writing the book is to prevent your current and future suffering because we can't do anything about the past suffering.

Maybe that's it. Agreed. Maybe that's it.

All right. Let's go back to the commentary by Vasubandhu. Please read.

And who's going to check you? Hang on. Let me see somebody cool here.

Chen Zong. Yes, please. Please.

Criticize this guy. Okay. dulja chindrawa sikla insena chindrawa chindrawa sikla insena dak tu tawa chendang korway ngepa ma shepa nam lao I'm going to let you translate this, you guys.

I'll give you the first half. You translate the second half, okay? And by the way, Vasubandhu has been asking a long list of questions to introduce us to the book, to introduce us to the sutra.

His commentary is extremely long. 123 folios, if I remember correctly. And then he's asking, well, what kind of disciple is this teaching made for?

What disciple was the teaching of the Twelve Links and First Principle? Who was that designed for? dulja means disciple.

And the answer is two kinds of disciples. You tell me, Sugeng. While I finish my cupse.

Somebody with the view of the existence of self. Sugeng, if you don't remember the word ngepa, ask Xiaoping. She knows.

Xiaoping, what is ngepa? Fault. What?

Fault. Oh, fault, okay. Yeah, problems or mistakes.

Oh, sorry. People who don't think that they have fault. Is that right?

Those who don't realize the kodwa ngepa. The fault of the wheel? Sorry.

Yeah, they think, oh, life's not so bad. You can make money. You can eat cupse.

It's not so bad. And they don't really understand that everybody's in the airplane which is going to fall down. We are all in the airplane.

No matter how young you are, no matter how healthy you are, you are headed for the same place as a cancer patient. We're all headed for the same place. So how do we translate this phrase of the real nature of the wheel?

What kind of disciples was this teaching meant for? First of all, those who think that the husband is coming from his own side. And those who are just...

Okay, Xiaoping, new word. You probably know this one, Xiaoping. Ignorance is bliss.

It means if you don't know about a problem, then you don't feel so bad. So he says there's people walking around who have no idea that their plane is crashing. And they're trying to make money.

They're trying to use makeup. They're trying to... They're trying all these stupid things to do in the middle of dying.

By the way, I'm supposed to get my second shot on Monday, right, Nick? Next week. And that's a mixed nuts day.

Veronica, for example, had a very strong reaction to the second shot. She was in bed for like 10 hours or something with a very high fever. Now she feels incredibly good.

But I was thinking, maybe I could just delay it for two days. Why is that a stupid idea? Conventionally, the next appointment you could get would be December.

I want to teach you something that you learn when you're 68. If you die, you can't teach a class. If you die, you can't teach a class.

So the first priority every day is... Don't die. Stay alive.

Because nothing else matters if you die. So listen, if you go around your whole life not understanding that you're in an airplane that's falling down, then of course you're going to be unhappy. You're denying the truth.

All right. Next one. Let's go.

Sugeng. Okay. Chundzong, please.

JI LTAR BDAG MED PA YIN PA DONG PA NI BA ZIG BYAS GANG GSUNGS PA YIN TE BDAG GANG BDAG GIS DANG BRAL BA ZHES GONG PA'O Okay, good. Now, we got to go back to the root text, okay? I'm going to take you back to the root text.

You ready? Yes. Okay.

All you're going to see here in this world is a mountain of pain. BA ZIG Okay? And by the way, BA ZIG means pure or perfectly or only pain.

Perfect pain. Nothing but pain. Nothing but pain.

BA ZIG. Okay? Got it?

[Speaker 2]
Yes.

[Speaker 1]
That's the root text. That's the root sutra. Now, he says here, if he's going to teach about how things don't have any self-nature, JI LTAR BDAG MED PA YIN TONG PA NI if he's going to teach about how things are not themselves, then why did he say only a pile of pain?

Is there any special reason why Buddha used the word BA ZIG? Which means only. Then the answer is when he said that, GANG TSUM PA DE he meant to say even this pile of pain is 100% PHYAL BA of BDAG and BDAG GIS.

[Speaker 2]
Oh my.

[Speaker 1]
It refers to me and myself? Yeah. This mountain of pain has nothing about it which is itself or belongs to itself.

And it's a reference to... There's nothing about our world which is me or mine. You can say that.

What is this DANG BRAL BA here? It means... Does not possess.

Does not possess. When he said this mountain of pain, when he said it's only a mountain of pain, he meant it's a mountain of pain which is not itself and which is not coming from anything of you. It seems like Vasubandhu wants to say emptiness with every single word of the sutra.

Maybe he just finished the Abhidharmakosha and he's tired of not talking about emptiness. Keep going.

[Speaker 2]
What's the cause of suffering?

[Speaker 1]
Who's going to check you, Cindy? Word, please. Word, please.

Okay. Yay, long sentence. Now, dear Gupa Diyang Yimbar, I have told you that why the Buddha wants to teach this book, and it's mainly to help people who don't understand that nothing is itself.

It's for people who don't understand that the husband in the kitchen doesn't exist that I'm teaching this book. Now, you have a problem with that? Why you don't accept that?

What's your problem that you can't believe what I just said? If you don't believe that the Sutra on Dependence is mainly to teach emptiness, if you have a problem with that, well, how about the other sutra? There's another sutra, and it says, DE LTAR BPAG PA NYIN TE THOB PA DANG LDAN PAR People who have a lot of learning.

People who have a lot of learning. We had it in somebody's text recently.

[Speaker 2]
Seiji, great learning.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, yeah, great, okay. People with a lot of learning, whether they're BPAG PAs or NYIN TEs, whether they're Arya or Nisanga, right, meaning Mahayana or Hinayana, here, okay. If they see correctly with their wisdom what, how things occur in dependence, DEN CIG DRAG BA BYUNG BA, and how things that have occurred, DRAG PA, independence, are pure, and how they really exist, okay, they can see that.

People with great learning, whether they are Bodhisattva, whether they are Mahayana or Hinayana, what they learn, what they see, is that they see the real nature of things which occur in dependence, okay. What do people of great learning see whether they are Mahayana or Hinayana? They see that dependence is empty.

That's it, that's the answer, okay. So don't tell me there's a problem with me saying that this sutra on dependence was mainly written for Mahayana people. No.

[Speaker 2]
Oh, for the people who understand this.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, who don't understand, yeah. Yeah, who believe in a self-nature. Dr. Dawa, right?

Two kinds of people, right? One was Dr. Dawa, what was the other one?

[Speaker 2]
One of you? Ignorance is bliss. They don't see the samsara as Oh, they don't see the problems of samsara, yeah.

[Speaker 1]
So, Vasubandhu is trying to prove that your book on dependence was written for people who didn't understand emptiness, okay. Then the guy says, I don't believe you. Then Vasubandhu says, look at this other sutra, it says whether you're Hinayana or whether you're Mahayana, the whole point is to try to see with your wisdom the true nature of things that are occurring and have occurred in dependence, okay.

Cool? All right. ,GYER PAR BYED NAS, ,DE'I SNGON GYI THA'I RJES SU BRTZAM PA, ,MA YIN PA LA SOGS PA DANG, Yeah, and then if you understand dependent origination's true nature, you won't be following those people who are looking for a first beginning to things.

Which is called SNGON GYI THA'. A front end. I like to call it a front end to samsara.

There is no front end to samsara. The idea of a beginning of the universe, the idea of a Big Bang is itself ignorant. The scientific idea of a Big Bang is ignorant.

RJES SU BRTZAM PA MA YIN PA LA SOGS PA He's trying to protect you from following people like that who don't understand the nature of dependence. Because if you understood the nature of the wheel, you would understand it has no beginning. Got it?

Yay! By the way, this quotation isn't in the Kangyur. It's only in the Tengyur in a commentary to the same sutra.

So it doesn't help. Did you have a question? Which word refers to the protect in the previous paragraph?

What did I say? Protect them from wrong ideas or something like that? Yes, yes.

He didn't really say protect. He said, these guys, even if they have learning, then whether they are Mahayana or Hinayana, they all understand the real nature of what occurs in dependence and what has occurred in dependence. So don't tell me it's not important to learn emptiness if this other sutra says it's so important for whether you're Mahayana or Hinayana to understand the real nature of dependence.

So don't think the purpose of the sutra dedicated to dependence is to teach dependence because it's not. What's the purpose of the sutra on dependence? To teach emptiness.

To teach the emptiness of dependence. Okay, got it? That's his point.

And the other guy just doesn't get it. He says, well, why didn't they call it the true nature of dependence sutra? Why did they call it the dependence sutra?

And he says, well, where did it come up? It came up in discussions of people thinking that samsara had a beginning. Okay, all right.

Here we go. Okay, Ben, please. Ben, please.

Okay, good. He's going to quote another sutra to prove to his reader that the real point of this sutra is to teach emptiness of dependence and not just dependence. So he says, by the way, there's another sutra where Kātyāyana, a famous disciple of Lord Buddha, who's called Kātyāyipu, he was thinking about jikten kunjungwa, where does the world come from, and yangdapa jiktawa shindu, yangdapa shirab, the wisdom which understands everything just as it is.

He was connecting where the world came from with seeing that things are empty. tongwa kanya ba de ni, jikten la me pa ni, You won't find that kind of viewpoint in the world. You won't find that kind of person and that kind of viewpoint in this world.

Why? Because it's difficult to perceive? I'll give you another choice.

If a person understood the emptiness of dependence, they would jump out of the... Yeah, the Wheel of Life. Then you won't notice them standing around.

Oh, okay. I see. He says, me pa ni.

You won't see them standing around here. Why? Because they're gone already.

Apparently there was other material here and then it picked up with it won't happen. Mingyuro. Mingyuro.

It won't happen. We don't know what that refers to because we don't have the rest of the sutra in between these two parts. But I think it's safe to say they don't happen around here and they can't happen around here because they're already gone.

pa du sum tso means I'm giving you two parts of a sutra quotation which support my idea that the emptiness of dependence is the real subject here. Okay? All right.

Keep going. Who's checking you, Sugeng? How about Nick?

Oh, you want to see emptiness, Sugeng? You want to see emptiness? Yes.

Okay. This is the plate with the sourd. This is the plate with the kapse.

You understand what I'm saying? Absolutely. Now, when I put them in the sink I have to cover this one with this one.

You understand? Go ahead. Go ahead.

Yeah. Good. Okay.

dak tu tawa pangpa kone Okay. Only if you pangpa your dak tu tawa What's it mean, Sugeng? Pangpa.

Only if you get rid of the view of self. Yeah. Meaning that the husband in the kitchen is coming from his own side.

Never forget that. Okay? Only if you get rid of that will all of this stop.

Minjung. Will all these links stop. Will all this pile of suffering stop.

Okay? And that is the gupa tsawa of this book. Gupa tsawa.

The foundation of the... Good. What is gupa?

What is purpose? Purpose. Oh, purpose.

Okay. Yeah. That.

Just that. Dengi. That.

Getting rid of this pile of suffering because you understand... because you got rid of thinking the husband came from his own side. That's the main point of this whole sutra.

Now, by the way, you can feel he's wrapping up his introduction, right?

[Speaker 2]
Yes.

[Speaker 1]
Listen. That's the point of this sutra. It's that you get rid of seeing things as coming from their own side.

That's the point of this sutra. kāyāndeni dōde dūcchong ne dekhi tendo And that's why the Buddha taught this sutra. Okay?

Got it? Yay. Yay.

So does it mean that... Now we can go. Does it mean that this commentary is considered as higher middle way or something?

Because it's talking about emptiness? I think that's a very intelligent question. And you're going to get clues through the whole commentary of who is Vasubandhu really.

Because in the Abhidharmakosha, he only gives you one clue. What's that, Stanley? The accountant.

Of his real identity. Only one clue? Come on, you just had it in your book.

[Speaker 2]
Oh, low, low, low, low, low.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, low. Yay. Killer.

Yeah, okay. Killer. Yes, you're killing me.

Yeah, okay. In the whole Abhidharmakosha, mainly, Vasubandhu only reveals his true self when he says, they say. That's what they say.

But here, he lets loose his real self. And you will see clues throughout the whole book of his real viewpoints. And I challenge you, Sugen, to follow the footsteps of countless Buddhist thinkers in the last 1,700 years, trying to figure out, is Vasubandhu really middle-weight, or is Vasubandhu really mind-only?

As you go through this commentary for most of the rest of your life, don't forget to ask this question. We're catching glimpses of the real Vasubandhu. Now, who was he?

What was he? And you already caught some glimpses, I think, of middle-weight so far. But you're going to catch some mind-only glimpses.

Okay, here we go. Okay. Mr. N. Timoteos, please.

[Speaker 2]
You know, you got to make some mistakes, because otherwise it's just boring for me. It is boring, yeah. Okay.

Be a teacher. Make a mistake. Help me out.

[Speaker 1]
Come on, you. We should charge money to Sugen if he doesn't make mistakes. Oh, yes.

Oh, Tenching. Tenching, Drelwar, Junpei, Sejawa. I'm not even entertaining that one.

[Speaker 2]
Tim, you are just such a little fuss-bucket.

[Speaker 1]
It's so difficult to satisfy. That sounded nasty, but it came out okay.

[Speaker 2]
Fuss, not fuss.

[Speaker 3]
Drelwar. Okay, good.

[Speaker 1]
Tenching, Drelwar, Junpei, Sejawa. Good job. I'm sorry.

Yeah, yeah. By the way, this might be the most important sentence of your text, okay? Why do we say, parthita samudpada?

Why do we say, things occur in dependence and connection? Because when we say dependence, we've been using that translation. But the original word is, things occur in dependence and connection, or in a connected dependence.

That's the real word as it's translated into Tibetan or even in Sanskrit. I'm curious what the Chinese is. But there should be words for dependence, and there also have to be words for connection.

Tenching drel, dependence and connection, is the Tibetan translation of dependent origination. I prefer to leave out the origination. I think it's too...

I think the minute you say dependent origination, you lose a lot of normal readers. They get confused. They say, I don't know what...

It definitely doesn't pass any kind of waiter test, right Xiaoping? Do you guys have any dependent origination on the menu? I think the origination might be referring to the first principle.

No, no. No, it's a bad translation. Okay, anyway.

He says, what do we mean that things occur through dependence and connection? Then he answers the question, and this is the most important sentence of the whole commentary probably. How do you define dependence?

The chain of dependence. He says, the YAN LAG PHYI MA occurs depending on the YAN LAG SNGA MA. That's all.

That's all. What? So the next branch, the next link depends on the previous link.

Exactly. The coming link depends on the link before. Okay, that's all.

What dependence means in Buddhism is that you get certain things happening from certain earlier things, and that's all. They depend on, and therefore they are connected to, earlier things. That's the meaning of dependence.

Dependence in Buddhism means, one of the twelve problems comes from one of the other twelve problems before it. But you see, he's defining dependence in terms of suffering. You see, Sugen?

Never forget that. Never forget that. Vasubandhu defined dependence as the chain of pain, or something like that.

Okay? Never forget that when Vasubandhu, in a hundred and twenty-three pages, in a thousand pages of English, that he defined dependence as one pain coming from another pain. Okay?

Got it? Geshe-la, what is this MA YAN LAG SNGA MA and then PHYI MA BYUNG BA'O? SNGA MA means the previous one.

The previous link. You're supposed to mentally add the word YAN LAG here. You're supposed to mentally add the word YAN LAG there.

The subsequent links occur in dependence on the previous links. That's what dependent origination means. You cannot describe the word dependence in Buddhism without referring to a cycle of pain.

That's the point. Okay? Yay!

When you're talking about dependence, you're always talking about something bad happening in the kitchen. By definition. By definition.

Okay, go! Utpala, please. Okay, go on.

This sentence is loaded with heavy, heavy meaning. You could diamond mine this sentence for about a week. DE NYID KYI DBANG DU BYAS NAS Now, relative to this fact that dependence always refers to a chain reaction of suffering, that's okay.

Relative to the fact that dependence always relates to a chain reaction of suffering, even the letters you use are following this theme. DUR BZHIN DU BDAG Even the letters we use, even the words we use, are following the same theme. They are also just...

Everything in this book is another word for emptiness. Everything in this book is another word for the fact that things are empty of any ultimate nature. DONG PA Even the words used in this sutra are also empty.

What's that mean? You know what? Some people will read them and say, exactly Abhidharma.

Yay! Then the logic guys will say, oh great, this is all logic. Then the mind-only guys will say, oh great, this whole sutra is mind-only.

The middle-way guys will say, oh finally, he taught middle-way. Even the words are emptiness. Now, Abhidharma people don't use the word DONG PA NI.

We talked about it. It's only used where?

[Speaker 3]
Mind. The sixteen aspects.

[Speaker 1]
Perfectly. Perfect. Perfect answer.

Yay! I'm glad I didn't offer money. We're out of time, Gen, just so you know.

Okay. Now, my note to myself when I was preparing for Sugeng's classes, when Vasubandhu says DONG PA NI here, by the way, you can search the Abhidharma kosha for the word DONG PA NI. I don't think you will find it.

Okay. Now, in the first page, he's already used it here. Are we getting a glimpse of?

His true nature? Yeah. Well, quote.

He's at least a mind-only guy. If he's saying DONG PA NI, he's already slipped. It's like those spies you send to the other country and then they slip and they use their own language by accident.

Like, oh, you're from Germany. Aha, now I know. Okay.

So he used the word DONG PA NI. That means he's at least a mind-only guy. In this book, he's dressed in a mind-only hat at least, possibly more.

[Speaker 2]
Okay. In Abhidharma, there's another place for emptiness. Where?

I was about to talk about the...

[Speaker 1]
Describing the universe before the world starts.

[Speaker 3]
The other one is the antidote for the four, how do you say, upside-down thoughts.

[Speaker 1]
Oh, ching gi lak shi. Yeah, okay. Okay.

Got it.

[Speaker 3]
Okay.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. Okay, cool. But in general, you should search the same text for DAG MED PA.

Search your text for DAG MED. I bet it's 20 times. All right.

Here we go again. Okay. Thank you, Geshela.

You're welcome. Boy, you're going into the deep end. It's getting more and more fun.

Yay. Yay. Thank you, Geshe-la.