Нагарджуна, курс 2 — Мудрость Арьи Нагарджуны, курс 2: Исследование величайшей мудрости древнего мудреца (2019, Аризона), занятие 5

[Speaker 1]
If you keep looking in the kitchen at your husband the way you've been looking at your husband in the kitchen, then you will never see nirvana. Then he goes to the next chapter. What's the next chapter?

Investigate desire. Investigate desire. Okay, I think when you teach it, it's very very important to say it's not wrong to want things, okay?

That's a big, stupid, low-chung, alpha-booty idea. Okay, small, mini-brain. I love that.

Maybe I'll call my band the mini-brains. I keep looking for a new name. Of course I have to have a band to name it, but that's in little detail.

Okay, he's going to investigate desire. Is it wrong to want things? Not at all.

I mean, we want to escape pain. This morning we did 13 step, you got that Tim? You want to put it up?

We did a 13 step meditation. By the way, there it is if you want to, if you want to slowly, or Tim can send it out, I don't know. You can take it with your phone, how's that?

Then I don't have to interrupt the class. That's the meditation we worked this morning. How did it feel?

I liked it. Yeah, we're doing all this emptiness meditation, we're not doing much sweetie pie meditation. I like this one.

Okay, those are the classic steps. Okay, it mixes three things for $30. It mixes ...ah, raise your hand. No money, no hand, no money, honey. Yeah, she didn't do one yet. Okay, go ahead.

[Speaker 2]
Tonglen.

[Speaker 1]
Tonglen.

[Speaker 2]
And seven steps to achieve bodhicitta.

[Speaker 1]
Mama, mama meditation.

[Speaker 2]
Mama meditation.

[Speaker 1]
Exchange, yes. Exchange yourself and others. Three greatest meditations in one.

That must be from Maha Buddhis. What's that? Big mind people.

Yeah, those are Mercedes Benz people. Okay, mental Mercedes Benz people. They mix these three kinds of love, three kinds of love meditation mixed together.

It should, maybe, you know, try this car for a few weeks. You know, do your lion's dance, do your afternoon Tonglen, and then try this car out. Try this new car out.

Okay, test drive it for me. Tell me what you think. Okay, when I see you in Bali.

We have some more space Jasmine? Where are you? Yeah.

Just for people from Diamond Mountain group, and their friends, and everybody else. There's 25 places left, okay. She can squeeze you in, okay.

You can sleep on the beach. Okay. Tell me how it went, okay, when we get to Bali.

That's in December, right? So, tell me how, how did this new car feel? How's this new car feel?

Okay. You're the first people to try this new car. I guess that you can call this a secret meditation that the Dalai Lama's teacher used to do.

Okay, so that's pretty chill, pretty cool, pretty sick. In surfing nowadays, if you had a really good wave, they say, ah man, that was a sick wave. Sick, that's a real sick meditation, Jason.

We tried that one. Okay, so we're going to go on to desire. I think it's kind of nice that we are leaving the Alpa Buddhis, okay.

We're leaving the accountants. By the way, we're supposed to cover six chapters in this course. OM MANI PADME IN SHES LA.

OM MANI PADME IN SHES LA. I don't know if we're going to make it, but I'm trying, okay. I'm really trying.

Okay, so here we go. We're moving on to desire and attachment, and here's the structure, okay. And by the way, we're going to take a break, Gina, in 11 minutes.

I told you, somebody asked me, how many students you want in your life, Geshe-la? 365, with different birthdays. Then I can get birthday cake every day.

So, maybe there's a birthday today, I don't know. Alright, so according to Choney Lama, Choney Lama is struggling like everybody else for the last 2,000 years. They're struggling to understand the structure of the 27 chapters, okay.

It looks like Nagarjuna is just, hey, check this out. Hey, check this out. Hey, check this out.

And it's difficult to see any real pattern, okay. It's difficult to see, he's going, there's logic. He throws out different subjects.

So, one of the most, one of the greatest things Choney Lama has done is to try to put it into a structure. He says, look, it's logical, you just can't see it. I'll help you, okay.

And he gives us a structure, okay. So, here he goes. GNYIS PA DE LA BDAG YOD PA'I SGRUB BYED RGA PA LA GSUM, okay.

SGRUB BYED means prove. DE GSUM means those three. What three?

Yeah, the subject of the three last chapters, which is basically PHUNG, say PHUNG, KHAM, SKYE MCHED GSUM. Abhidharma first chapter. The most famous first chapter in history of Buddhism, okay.

Parts of you, PHUNG, KHAM, the 18 categories or the five elements. SKYE MCHED, the 12 sense powers and their objects. He said, look, we finished those.

Now, he says, let's go on to arguments people make. You know, people try to give arguments of why those three should come from their own side, okay. Now, maybe you noticed each one of the chapters already started with somebody making an argument, okay.

You know, oh, the eye should be connected to the blue, there should be a nature of the eye to the blue, because Buddha taught it, okay. Or there should be a connection between the chemicals in your body and the body that they produce. If there's no connection, how can you be walking around?

Okay, got it? What was the third one? SKYE.

Oh, yeah, if it has a definition, and you're going to define it. Duh, there's a connection, you know. You don't use fish definition to fit empty space.

There must be some connection, okay. That's the guy, the other guy, okay. Now, the other guy is going to say, I have new arguments for you.

Why the husband come from his own side? I have new arguments, and he's going to give three, okay. First, he's going to talk about negative emotions.

There is some self-nature, atman, in negative emotions, okay. Oh, by the way, before I forget, there's one word you need to finish your homework, your last homework. It's another Sanskrit word, okay.

Let me find it for you. Okay, on homework number four, there are three Sanskrit words. If you don't know them, you can't finish your homework.

One of them, we finish this definition. What's the Sanskrit? Lakshana, which also means the sign that's glued to the thing which indicates this is fire.

Hot, and burns you, okay. If you get those two signs, then that's fire, okay. If it's hot, and if it burns you when you touch it, aha, that's the lakshana, that it's a fire, okay.

It's kind of like the signs that belong to that thing. Okay, got it? Okay, that's lakshana, we finished that.

What's the English word? Leech? That worm that connect to your skin, eat your skin, cannot disattach, huh?

Huh? Yeah, glue you can say also, okay. So, connected to that thing.

By nature, nobody made fire hot, right? Wrong. Yeah, you made fire hot.

You made fire hot. Okay, got it? You made husband stupid, okay.

Don't blame the husband. Okay, just kidding. Say akasha, space, empty space, right?

Did I give you the Sanskrit? I'll just repeat it. It means space or empty space, akasha, and it comes from a root kas, K-A-S, the root is kas, K-A-S, and it means to open, but in the sense to cut open, okay?

Like you cut something and you open it, and you see what's inside. Okay, so akasha. Akasha means very open.

That ah means very, it's not the negative ah, okay. Akasha, very much, very open. And English words are cast, which means a society group, they cut into different groups.

Or castrate, which means to cut the male organ from the cow, okay. Or chest, which means cut off from bad qualities. It means a very good person, okay.

Okay, they all come from cast, cast, okay. But the one I'm really interested in, and the one I didn't teach you yet, that you need to do homework for, is purva. Say purva.

Okay, purva. Purva means before, came before. Purva.

Same in Indonesian, Basa, yeah. Purva. Oh, purvakala.

So a lot of their language, a lot of Basa language from Indonesia comes from this, okay. Purva means before. It comes from a root per, which means to pass, to pass, okay.

And the English cognates are before and forward. Per became for, okay. Forward.

Okay, $50. It's okay. I have to ask, you know.

We're getting married. I got to get used to it. Why is purva important in this last chapter?

What was the last chapter about? No, that's the next chapter. Six, five.

What's chapter five about? Space, yeah. Which came first?

The definition? Oh, I just gave you the answer. Okay.

A lot of these Nagarjuna arguments are based on which is purva. Which is purva. Okay, so the word, it's a small word.

It's not a very important word. You know, you don't spend two hours talking about before. But in this book you do.

You have to talk about before, okay. Which came first? The elements or the products of the elements?

Which came first? Your eye or the blue cup? Which came first?

Which came first? Which came first? The husband?

Yelling husband or the wife? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What's the rang lug?

Human computer. What's the rang lug mean? Yeah, you get hungry in these books for, just tell me what's right Nagarjuna.

You know, stop all these arguments, you know. I understand you like to argue. I understand you like to fight.

We read the whole book, we listened to it for day after day after day. Now can you just tell us what's correct? You know, what's your system?

Okay, what is our system? Which came first? The cup or the eye?

Or yeah, neither one. They're both coming at the same time. It's the rang lug.

Okay, they are growing from sharing your coffee with other people last week. Okay, Geshe Michael's tongue patch, taste patch, and the coffee are coming from the same cause. Which is kindness to other people.

Which is kindness to other people. If your emptiness discussion doesn't reach kindness, you don't understand emptiness. Okay, if your emptiness blah blah blah blah blah, and you don't use it as a reason to take care of other people, then you failed.

You failed as a Buddhist. Okay, got it? And if you're kind without understanding why, you also failed as a Buddhist.

Okay, if you're kind but you don't know why, you also fail as a Buddhist. Okay, got it? Okay, because it won't last.

It will break. You know, when there's only a little bit of cake, and only one person can get it, it will fail. Okay, thank you for the coffee Maria.

How are you? What's that alarm? Wait, Maria.

You ready? That's a birthday alarm for Maria. One, two, three.

Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear Maria.

Happy birthday to you. Okay, it's not Alay's sister. It's her mother.

Here we go. You are going to have cake. We can see that when the cow pie is actually coming out of a cow, then for a short time, the cow pie's bottom becomes its top.

Do you follow me? Gyaltsabje nods, concentrating fiercely, but then she says, when it topples over and plops on the grass, the top, as it were, changes into the bottom. Do you see?

Okay, wait, wait, wait. This needs a commentary. Okay, just short commentary.

So Tsongkhapa had a very famous student named Gyaltsabje, but he was famous before he met Tsongkhapa, and he was the greatest logician in Tibet. And very, very famous, and a little bit proud to tell you the truth. And he heard Tsongkhapa, Tsongkhapa started to get very popular, it's like me and art, okay?

And Tsongkhapa started to get very popular as a teacher. So Gyaltsabje makes a plan, I will go to his teaching and I will disrupt it. I will mess up the teaching, which is very bad karma.

And so he's a little bit late to get to the teaching, so he decided to take a shortcut, which you are not going to do at Diamond Mountain. He decided not to keep the building in sight. He cut shortcut, then he got lost, okay?

And he's late. So then he saw, he got lost, he saw a girl herding cows, okay? Cow herd girl, dirty, poor, uneducated, and he said, you know, do you know where's Big Nose giving the teaching today?

So the Tsongkhapa's, people who didn't like Tsongkhapa called him Mr. Big Nose, nagu chenpo. It means, hey, do you know where Big Nose is giving the teaching today? And the girl's like, Big Nose?

I don't know any Big Nose. Who's asking? He says, I'm Gyaltsabje.

And she's like, wow, you're Gyaltsabje? Yeah. You're the great logician?

Yeah, that's me, yeah, and I'm famous everywhere. Even the cow girls know me. And then she said, oh, I always had a logic question in my mind, you know?

And he's like, go ahead, I have time, I'm not in a big rush. And she said, you know, all day long I'm taking care of these cows, and sometimes they make a poo-poo. And when they make a poo-poo, the tail comes up.

If you watch a cow make a poo-poo, then the butt comes up, and the poop comes up, and then the poop comes down. So when the poop first come out, this is the bottom. But when it could fall down, the bottom become the top.

So logically, what's the top of the poop, and what's the bottom of the poop? Then Gyaltsabje is like, I don't know, I don't know. Then the girl said, oh, okay.

Oh, and the guy you're looking for, the unmatched greatest lama, fantastic beautiful man, greatest heart, savior of Tibet, is that what you're looking for when you say big nose? Then suddenly she has incense in her hand, like that. She said, I bow to Tulkapa.

And the incense start burning, and Gyaltsabje is like, oh. And then she said, then she changed into Vajragini. Then she said, if you want to go to his teaching, that way, go that way.

Then he's like, whoa. Then he, you want the rest of the story? So that's the poop, okay.

Then, but on the way, he forget about Vajragini, and he has a big, big lama hat, you know, and he decide he will walk into the teaching with the lama hat, which is very disrespectful. It's like, you should take off your cowboy hat. So he wear his hat, he go to the temple where Tsongkapa's teaching, and one of Tsongkapa's teaching, Ngawangdrapa, teacher, student, Ngawangdrapa, Sako Umbo, who is that?

Yeah, the one who got the three principle path letter. He can read people's mind, and he see Gyaltsabje coming, he said, he's not going to take his hat off. And he climb up on the roof very fast, and he get a long string and a hook.

And just when Gyaltsabje come in the door, he hook the hat, and the hat come off on Gyaltsabje's hand. And everybody look at the door. They said, wow, even Gyaltsabje take his hat off.

This Tsongkapa must be amazing person. Then Gyaltsabje said, then he said, I will go up and sit with Tsongkapa on the throne, which is completely against every Buddhist rule. So he go up and sit with the lama.

And Tsongkapa's like, oh hi. And Tsongkapa keep teaching, you know, about logic actually. And then Gyaltsabje's like, I don't know, this is pretty good stuff.

I think I should get down there. So he moved down there, you know. And then Tsongkapa keep teaching, teaching, teaching.

And then Gyaltsabje say, oh my god, this guy, he's beyond, beyond, beyond. And he bow down to Tsongkapa. And he said, please let me stay with you my whole life.

I don't want to leave you my whole life. So, that's the poop story. Yay!

You need a break? Let's take a little break, okay? We'll take a little break.

So, you got purva, right? Before, and you know why it's important. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

Same question. Okay, okay. Take a break.

All right. One more small part here. Yeah, so you have purva.

And now you can do that homework. Now we're going to talk about, so we're going to talk about desire, and the thing that you want. And let's say I have desire for alcohol, okay?

Both of my parents were alcoholic. So I grew up with the alcoholics, you know, and I, you know, it was everywhere in the house, and it caused a lot of problems. And so I used to wonder, you know, when your parents are alcoholic, you're like, wow, that must be really good.

And then when they go out one day, you try to drink that stuff, and you're like, ah, what's wrong with this guy? Why are they drinking that stuff? And it tastes terrible, right?

So, in the sixth chapter, we're going to investigate where is the pleasure in the alcohol, okay? Where is the pleasure in the alcohol? So many people are addicted to alcohol, or it could be chocolate, or other things, okay?

But where is the pleasure? Like in the aspirin, where is the chemical that takes away your pain, okay? And in the alcohol, where is the stuff that makes you feel more relaxed if you drink wine?

Where is it in the wine, okay? And then when the wine touches your tongue, then how does it happen that you feel more relaxed, okay? What is in the wine that makes you more relaxed?

So, we have to talk about it, okay? We're going to talk about desire, and it's like talking about the aspirin. There's something in the wine that makes you relax, or you believe that, and how does the wine touch your tongue, and how does it affect your mind, okay?

And then how do people start to get addiction, okay? How does that happen? And it's very important for all of us, because according to Buddhism, we're all addicted to something, okay?

And some addictions are legal, you know? Like in the US now, many states made it legal to use marijuana. It used to be illegal, now it's legal.

So, some addictions are legal, okay? That you don't go to jail in many places in America now if you're smoking marijuana, which is really bad idea by the way. It makes you really stupid.

If you want to get more stupid, smoke marijuana. Easy method, alright? Then some addictions are illegal, right?

Like cocaine or heroin, some are illegal. And some addictions are approved by society. Like if people overwork too hard, people praise them.

Oh, you're hard-working, you know? They ignore their kids, they ignore their family, they ignore their parents. They go higher, higher position in the company.

They never go home. It hurts a lot of people, but society says oh, this is a good addiction. We like this addiction.

You are a real, what do you call it? Big executive, you know? You're a hard-pushing executive.

It's amazing you can do so much, okay? So, some addictions are approved. Some addictions are, you have to keep quiet, right?

Some addictions you have to hide, right? So, addictions are a big question. How does desire work?

How do you get what you want out of your addiction? If you're addicted to, a lot of people in America are addicted to sugar, sweet things, and so when your tongue touches the churro and you get that first sweet taste from the churro, right? So, what's happening?

How is it possible? Okay? How are the little pieces of sugar touching your tongue?

How is the pleasure going from the churro to your tongue? And we have to think about it. We have to find the answer, okay?

And this is a whole level, what level in DCI? Level six, about addiction. And I'm going to tell you where we want to go and then we're finished today.

We can continue tomorrow, but I'll tell you where I want to go with addiction, okay? This is chapter six. This is where I want to go.

The reason my parents drank alcohol and died, they both died from alcohol, they wanted happiness, they wanted pleasure, you know? Many, many people drink wine at dinnertime, they say it makes me more relaxed, okay? So, we believe, or we feel strongly, that there's some relaxation exists in the wine.

Somehow, the wine has something inside which makes us relax. We believe that. That's why you drink wine before dinner, and that's why many people drink wine before dinner.

In Sedona, the population mix is mostly hippies about my age, okay? There are hippies who had some money and went to Sedona because it's a little bit, you know, spiritual place. And so, wine is very popular there.

Every store sells many kinds of wine, because when you get to 50, 60 years old your body start to hurt, different things start to hurt. Every day there's a new story. And so, people drink wine, you know?

At the store, the grocery store has a thousand kinds of wine. You know, it's supposed to sell bananas and, I don't know, bread, and there's, half the store is wine. So, it means the population in that city, they like to have a little wine before they go to bed, it helps them to sleep, it makes them more relaxed, okay?

But it has all these other problems, okay? So, we have to investigate, right? We're going to do an investigation of wine.

How does it work? You know, what does it do for you? And my goal, okay?

My goal in this class, and I think Nagarjuna's goal, it's not that you shouldn't like things. That's a misunderstanding of Buddhism, okay? You look at those paintings of Buddhist heaven, Amitabha's heaven, not everybody like this, you know?

They're having fun, okay? But they don't have desire, you see? They don't have wrong desire, okay?

So, I think you have to divide between good desire and bad desire. And this is where we're going, this is where chapter six is going, okay? Is it wrong to want to be happy?

Is it wrong to want to relax before dinner, or before you go to bed? Is that a bad thing? Are you a bad person if you buy wine because you want to be relaxed, you know?

Are you a bad person? Is it all people who buy wine cannot be Buddhist, right? You're a bad person, okay?

Is that the meaning of desire? What does desire mean? So, we're going to talk about desire, and the goal, okay?

Here's the goal, is to get the feeling that you get from the wine, and you don't even need the wine, okay? You want, we're going to find, we're going to investigate wine, to find out how you can get the pleasant feeling from wine without the wine, and it's much cheaper, okay? Alright, understand?

That's where we're going. I'm not teaching you the chapter about desire so that you can become super boring person, who never laugh, who never enjoy their food, never enjoy their life. It's not my goal.

The goal is the opposite. I want you to enjoy everything, okay? What's the secret to enjoy everything, okay?

Alright, cool. Alright, that's where we're going. Alright.

Alright, let's go back to Mr. Nagarjuna. We are reaching chapter six. This is an investigation of desire and attachment.

Good, and I started to teach you those words. Now, on the homework, I think the last part is the last part of the last chapter, and we had, what was the last idea in the last chapter? Huh?

Purva is pretty good. Alpa buddhi, please. Yeah, mini brains.

Okay, mini brains. Alpa buddhi means people who have small brain. Okay, and Nagarjuna is a little bit hot, right?

He said, oh, hi mini brain. Hi mini brain. It's kind of an insult, right?

Hey mini brain, how are you? You know, oh, you can't figure it out. What?

$50. What? What was in that verse?

Don't look. What was in the verse? Why, why he called them mini brain?

Wait, Seiji, are you raising your hand or there's a fly? Okay, okay, let's hear it. Nice.

Okay, $25 each. Thinking that things exist from their own side or that they don't exist at all. $75 answer.

It's a $75 answer to a $50 question. See, if you give a really good answer, it's like, I don't know, you get a tip. Alright, good answer.

Yeah, he said if you think things have to exist from their own side, but if they don't, then they don't exist at all. Then you lost the middle way, and you're an alpa buddhi. You have a small mind.

Okay, you have a small mind. That, we finished the last chapter. Okay, now we go to investigation of desire and attachment.