Учения Великого ретрита, часть 2. Сила самайи: достичь неподвижности на крыльях священной клятвы (2012, Боуи), занятие 4

[Speaker 1]
That is the noise that yaks make. Okay, we will meditate. Settle down your breath.

Pull in your tummy just a little bit. Relax your forehead, face. Relax your eyes.

Relax your lips. Please come to your breath. Start counting your breath.

Please come to your heartbeat. Then come inside of your heart. Beating heart into the hollow, inside the beating heart.

There is a room in a small cabin on a high mountain overlooking a valley. On all the walls are windows, high windows, large windows. And through the windows pours sunlight, golden sunlight.

And it flows over all the objects in the room. It's not a light yellow, it's a golden yellow. And it's not airy, it's liquid.

And it covers all the objects in the room. You are sitting in that sunlight, inside your beating heart. Then bring your teacher, smiling, happy, golden, warm, friendly, loving, proud of you, to come and sit with you.

Then see if you can enjoy the moment with your heart teacher, just happy in the sun, sitting with each other. No special agenda, just to be together quietly, companionable silence. And we'll spend a few minutes here in the sunlight.

Then please come back to the beating of your heart. Then slowly release the meditation. Stretch.

Okay, so this is a Buddhist teaching. The people in the audience, by tradition, watch the teacher and don't speak to each other or make signs to each other. This is a tradition in Buddhism.

Like a deer, listening like a deer in the forest to a song. I tried it the other day, I sang mandala to a deer. They actually stop, and they stand there really dumb.

They say, you could shoot them then. Of course you wouldn't want to. Okay, we're on the third monk's vow, which is sok chöpa, which means killing.

I wanted to say some more about details of the vow. So, one we've talked about many times together. It comes from the Abhidharma.

We saw it in the Abhidharma. And it's a question of, if my country is engaged in a war, right? We talked about that.

Do I collect the karma of killing? Have I broken my monk's vows about not killing a human being? If my country is fighting a war, right?

And there are two principles here. One is that in a group effort to harm other people, you are fully responsible for any killing that is done. But then there's another sentence after that.

It's very beautiful. In the scripture it says, if you have been forced by people from your country to fight, if you have been, what do you call it? Drafted, I guess.

Or if you have been forced in some way to do the fighting, and in your heart you feel compassion or sadness for the fighting, and you don't support it, you feel sadness and you feel compassion, then you don't collect the pambha, okay? You don't create the third defeat, okay? And I think that has implications in general.

If you inform the authorities that you are not in support of that effort, clearly, then you don't collect the full karmic path. I like these. All right, then we had associated vows, okay?

We have to kind of move fast today, okay? So don't mind. Because we're supposed to be on vow number four by now.

Monk's vow number 95 and monk's vow number 96. 95 is DEG PA'I SDUG BSNGAL. 96 is DEG PA'I SRED PA'I SDUG BSNGAL.

DEG PA means to strike another human being, okay? To strike another person. Like with your fist to hit another person.

I used to fight all the time when I was a little kid. I grew up with four brothers, no father, okay? So we were like squirrels, rolling around on the floor all the time, frequently.

But we had a rule, and nobody decided on it. It just felt correct that we never hit each other in the face, right? Or, you know, we had...

I don't know who decided. Like you could punch people's arms, that was okay. This part of your arm was okay.

And you could roll around the floor and you could do arm locks and stuff, but you never ever hit another person in the face. And none of us ever did. None of the four brothers ever did.

There was a time... We got to high school. Me and my older brother broke a chair over each other.

And then we decided... But then we shook hands and we said, okay, now we're grown up, we shouldn't do this anymore. And we never had a fight after that.

In the whole family, we never had a fight after that. And in my adult life, I was trying to think if I've ever struck a person, you know, out of anger. And I was thinking...

First I was thinking, have I ever been struck as an adult by another person with a fist in the face or in the head? Because this feels very wrong, right? I can't think of a thing which feels more wrong than to strike another person.

I think for everyone in the whole world, equally, it feels very wrong to strike another person's body and to hit, especially their face or something, out of anger like that. Then I was thinking, have I ever struck a person in my adult life? And I have.

I had a student in New York who was very close to me. Then one day they were being very naughty in the class, right? Then I was thinking, what should I do, you know?

What should I do with them? Because I thought they didn't listen to anything and everything I ever tried didn't work with them. And then I remembered Geshe Yarmel, okay?

So when you write my secret biography, you have to write about Geshe Yarmel, okay? Geshe Yarmel was a Kalmyk Mongolian, okay? He, which means Black Sea, he grew up on the Black Sea in the 1910s, okay?

And then his dream was to go to Lhasa and become a Geshe, right? Because they followed the Dalai Lama, the Golden Horde, the remnants of the Golden Horde. They're called Kalmyk.

Kalmyk means remnants, right? So anyway, he jumped on the Trans-Siberian Railroad. If you care, he debated Vostokov in Peterburg on the way, okay?

But nobody knows about either one of them. And then he came to Siberia. And then he got on a camel and crossed the Gobi Desert.

And then he came down into Tibet and walked from East Tibet to Lhasa. And he became a Sarambha Geshe. You know, he succeeded.

He entered Gomong College of Durban. And he became a Sarambha Geshe. And he gained the support of one of the highest aristocrats in Tibet, which helps, because it's expensive to be a Sarambha Geshe, even nowadays, okay?

Then when Tibet was lost, he escaped to India, and then he came to America, okay? And then I stayed in a Mongolian temple in New Jersey for, I don't know, 20 years or something. 25 years.

And he was the abbot, when I got there, of the monastery. And then he was a stubborn man, which he would have had to be, right? Because he learned Tibetan.

He didn't know Tibetan when he got to Tibet. He became a Sarambha. Then a highest Geshe, right?

I'm not a Sarambha, I'm a little Geshe. Okay, so anyway, then he... Right when I got there, he had an eye operation.

He had cataracts, and they did an operation on his eyes. And then the doctor said, you cannot take the bandages off for three days. You must not touch the bandages for three days.

He wanted to read Chimtsu, which is Chimjambayang's commentary on the Abhidharmakosha. So he took the bandages off the first morning, and then he went blind, okay? Then he was always blind after that.

So they invited my teacher, my Tibetan teacher, Khen Rinpoche, to come to the temple and be the abbot because Geshe Yonpo was blind. Geshe Yonpo didn't like that. So there was a big...

You know, the Dalai Lama sent my teacher to replace him, but he didn't want to retire. And he was really stubborn. He would make momos and cook blind.

I had to stay with him for like three years because I couldn't get any other place to stay. It was really hard. But he very much resented Khen Rinpoche.

So I thought, you know, he would come to the temple and he would try to lead the prayers from memory, and he knew all of them from memory. And Khen Rinpoche would try to sort of accommodate him, but there was a lot of friction, tension. So one day, I'm watching from the window on the second floor of the house we built for Rinpoche, and Geshe Yonpo was making his way to the temple.

He had a cane, and he would swing the cane and hit the trees to know where he was coming down the path. So I thought I will please my teacher by criticizing this other monk, making fun of this other monk who he was having tension with. So when he got close and his stick hit the tree, I yelled out the window, Ouch!

And then I got this bang on my head. Instantly I got bang. Rinpoche hit me really hard on the side of the head, like with his hand.

And I was like, Wow! I didn't know where I was for a while. And he said, Never do that again.

That's very wrong. I thought he'd be happy. So anyway, I'm in New York with this student, and I'm like, Maybe that will work.

So I didn't hit them in the face, but I hit them on the side of the head with my palm. It kind of worked. And I won't tell you who it was, but you know them.

And they became a good teacher. They're still teaching. And they're still quite a popular teacher.

And so I think it helped. So there are extraordinary circumstances, maybe. And that's the only time in my adult life that I've hit a person.

Then I was thinking, the next vow, Dekpa Srepe Tungje, 96, is called to raise your hand or to come close to hitting another person. Okay? To raise your hand in anger or to make as if to hit someone.

Then I was thinking if I ever did that in my life, in my adult life, because you can't count your brothers. And I have done it three times in my adult life. One was a guy named Jim, and I worked on a truck with him in college, and he did something really dangerous.

And I got hurt. So I pushed him, and he fell down. And it felt really, really wrong to me.

I felt like I had done something really, really wrong. He fell down. Then once I did it to my brother when he was in high school.

So I'm counting that as adult, okay? He was being really bad, and I pushed him, and he fell down. And then in the Lama House here, in Diamond Mountain, up the road, there was a student being naughty, and I got angry, and I pushed him down.

So those are the three times. That would be, what do you call it? Dekpa Srepe Tungje.

Those are the only three times in my life that I felt like hitting somebody, but didn't quite do it, okay? So those are two monks' vows that relate to killing. Monks' vow 67 is called RIM PA LHAG PAR TSIG PA.

Please don't say, RIM PA LHAG PAR TSIG PA. RIM PA you know from Lam Rim, it means stages. LHAG PA you know from LHAG DONG, Vipasyana, is it Vipasyana?

Yeah. It means special or extra. And then TSIG PA means to build a wall, okay?

To build the levels of a brick of a wall. What do you call it? There's a line of bricks.

You call it a line of bricks when you're building a wall. And a monk is not allowed to build more than, I think it's two and a half lines of bricks in the wall of a temple per day, okay? Then you have to stop and let the mortar dry, okay?

Why? There's a lang shi. Yeah, some guy was in a hurry on an adobe house and he put too many lines of bricks up and then it fell and somebody was under it, right?

So I think you always have to think, what are the implications of a vow? Why did Lord Buddha send us this vow? Because supposedly he's omniscient, right?

He knows all things. He knows that we will be here on Sunday in 2012, is it? You're not supposed to know, I guess.

And it relates to public safety, okay? It means, especially if you have a retreat center or something like that, the last director of operations that we had at Diamond Mountain was a big stickler on staying legal and meeting the codes. And why?

Why should we put the solar in properly? And why should we build the temple to spec? And why can't we have an adobe house that falls down on people?

It's a matter of public safety, okay? So part of not killing, part of respecting life is what you could call public safety and rules of public safety, okay? So I mean a Buddhist person would respect those rules in a very careful way, okay?

Why? Because they're noble? Yes.

Why? Because God will strike them down if the thing falls on somebody? Probably.

But the big thing is, if as an organization or as an individual you do something which endangers other people, like talking on your cell phone while you drive. I had a lady almost ran me off the road the other day, and I'm like, damn, I caught up to her. It's like road rage.

And I look over and she's texting at 70 miles an hour. And she didn't even look at me. I wanted to just give her a dirty look, but she was too busy, you know?

And this is a matter of public safety, okay? Then, you know, the laws which are created in a country are meant to protect everyone. So a Buddhist person, we are, there are many Vinaya vows about honoring the laws of where you live, right?

If you don't agree with them, then do a Gandhi thing and fight against them publicly. But in the meantime, you should follow them, okay? Don't sneak around them, okay?

You have to follow the laws of where you live, especially in a country like this. This fits the definition of a dharmic kingdom in the ancient scriptures. You are free to practice whatever religion you want, right?

You are free to hold whatever beliefs you have. We don't have a fear here of, you know, shock troopers walking in and machine-gunning us for talking about Buddhism, right? Which happens in other countries, okay?

So, Gandhi had a very beautiful belief, you know? It was that if you live in a country, then you should keep their laws, right? If you morally disagree with the law, then you should openly disagree and you should go to jail for it.

It's okay. Like that. But in the meantime, almost every law that's in this country is reasonable and it really protects people.

So then you should honor them, okay? What's the karmic result of that? Your body will not get sick.

Your body will have energy. You will never be tired. You will have good health.

If you keep it up carefully enough, your body turns into light, okay? And that's the point of keeping these vows so closely and so carefully, you know? I will respect...

I like in my... What do you call it? When I was in prison doing the automobile safety class, I was, you know...

They were like, Michael, where do you live? I'm like, I live out in nowhere. I have a dirt road, you know?

And they said, when you turn in the driveway, do you put your blinker on? And I said, I don't know. Like the deers don't care.

There's no people around. I've never seen a car drive by there. They're like, put your blinker on.

It's a good habit, you know? One day you'll be on the highway and there'll be a car next to you that you don't see. And if it's a reflex to put the blinker on, you might save your life and you might save somebody else's life.

So that's a beautiful... These are beautiful laws, okay? We should honor them.

We should respect them, okay? Protect other people's lives. Public safety.

I was in an Asian country recently and they had a guy up on the roof of the 24th floor cutting a hole into the steel roof with a diamond saw with no cover on it, hanging one leg off the edge, no rope. And I'm like, thank God for America, you know, OSHA and all that, okay? It's a good country.

We should keep those laws. I'm kind of watching the time, okay? I'll try to go fast, but it's impossible for Geshe Michael because he likes to talk.

There are now a whole bunch of monk's vows that relate to... How shall I put it? Honoring other people's health and honoring the condition of their body by not disturbing their mind, okay?

So it's a whole set of vows that relate to not disturbing other people's minds because when you disturb someone's mind, it hurts their health. And you know that, okay? People come to me, they just had a big breakup with a partner, maybe a longtime partner, and it hurts your health, right?

The first thing I do is I... You know, even before I tell them about karmic seeds and all that, I have them walking outside, looking at the trees, getting fresh air, you know, eating well, spending time with their friends, watching videos, which you can't do, because within a few weeks they will have a serious health problem. It's a big shock on the system, right?

The mental trauma hurts the physical body, okay? Which is all Prana stuff, but you know all that. Okay, so here are some of those vows.

First one is Monk's Vow 49. It's called Khyen Mawey Tung Je. I really love it.

Lord Buddha was very radical in his time because he opened up spiritual practice to people of any caste, okay? So it didn't matter whether you're from royal caste or you were a Brahmin caste or you were a farmer caste. If you became a monk, you were totally equal to all other monks in every respect.

So it was almost like the first democracy. You know, the original Sangha, 500 BC, was a radical idea. And even today, there's a movement, Dr. Ambedkar, I think, in India, for untouchables to become Buddhists because then they...

and then Buddhists have gotten a bad name because, oh, there's a lot of untouchables, right? So, in the Sangha, this vow prohibits any of us from disparaging another monk because of their racial background or their previous caste before they become a monk. Once you become ordained, you are in every way equal to the others.

And if you disparage another monk for being of a different race or background, then you broke this vow, okay? I like it. It's a beautiful vow.

For me, I think it... For me, personally, I like to try to relate all the vows to myself, right? I think it's very strong in our opinion of the Mexican people, okay?

And I think when I went to Mexico and when I went to Spain, when I spent a lot of time there and we had beautiful, beautiful programs with Mexican people, I became aware of my prejudice that I had grown up with. I grew up in Phoenix and then I suddenly became aware that I was a prejudiced person, you know? And that I had certain expectations about how a Mexican person should look or act or what they eat or...

Subtle, subtle, you know? Deep down prejudices. So, I think you have to watch those.

When you hold them, you break your vows, okay? Monk's Vow 54. NENG'EN LEN SPYOD PA This is...

If you see a monk or a nun make a mistake, NENG'EN LEN, we talked about it last time, right? But in Vinaya it has a different meaning. It means to gossip about another person's mistakes with other people, okay?

Especially monks and nuns, okay? M63 SPYOD PA'I DUNG BYAS To frighten another monk, okay? Like jump out and go boo, you know?

No, I mean, there was some Lengshi, okay? Some monk hid behind a boulder, a dime mountain, and some other monk walked by in the dark and then they jumped out and went, and it hurts the person's health, right? Okay, that's a little bit of killing.

M64 CHI NENG'I DUNG BYAS This is an interesting vow. You should study it. Somebody should study this one.

Somebody should write a book about this one, okay? Chi nengpa means, silky nengpa, means to put down another person strongly, okay? To damage another person's self-esteem is breaking a monk's vow, okay?

It's very interesting. So if you strongly put down another person or hurt their feelings in a strong way, you broke a vow. And eventually it will hurt their health also.

If you hurt their self-esteem. Monk's vow 109. RGYAL PA SKYE PA'I DUNG BYAS RGYAL PA you know it means regret.

It's one of the four powers, for example, of confession. And RGYAL PA SKYE PA means to cause regret in another person. And it's a specific kind of regret.

A fully ordained monk is not allowed to hint or say to another monk that they believe that their vows were not formed properly, okay? There was some problem with the ceremony. I saw the abbot yawn just at the time that he snapped his fingers, and I don't think the vows formed properly in you.

And then for the rest of their lives, the monk is wondering, you know, do I have the vows or not, you see? So there's a specific vow about causing another person to doubt their ordination. That's breaking a vow.

RGYAL PA SKYE PA'I DUNG BYAS We had that one already. That's another monk's caring vow. 113.

Monk's vow 114. RGYAL PA SKYE PA'I DUNG BYAS This is to hide another monk's possessions maliciously, okay? So like, somebody leaves their fur hat in your bathroom, like this morning, and if you didn't go after them and try to give it back to them, but rather you hid it under a rock and then left Diamond Mountain, then that would be RGYAL PA SKYE PA'I DUNG BYAS, okay?

It's out of malice to hide other monks' stuff, and it's mean. It hurts their heart, right? And that hurts their health.

And it's contributing to a shorter life, okay? It's all kinds of... it's all kinds of violence to another person's body, okay?

All right. Monk's vow 108. Must be auspicious, right?

DUNDRO SUTPA To kill or cause an animal to be killed. Okay? To kill an animal or to cause an animal to be killed.

And then there's a thing in the vow that says not secondary to another action. If you are out making a delivery to the retreatants and, you know, a rabbit runs across... It happens to me sometimes where I live.

It happened once. I killed a mouse, and I was afraid I ran it, hit it. Then I stopped and I turned around.

This is on a big, you know, mountain hill. And I did. I saw that I killed it, right?

So, that's not considered breaking this vow because it was secondary to one of your normal activities, and you were taking reasonable caution not to kill an animal. Okay? But otherwise, you're breaking a monk's vow to kill an animal.

I don't see then how a monk could eat meat.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
Personally. All right. Monk's vow 120.

SAKKOA To dig in the earth without compelling need. To dig in the earth without compelling need. Because you will kill creatures.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
My rose gardening manual says, if you live in the desert, and in the third year you get worms, you're really a good gardener. You know? And then I got worms.

I can say with pride, I have worms. But now it's really weird because I can't... I have to be really careful when I...

What do you call it? Mulch the soil? Because I cut them in half.

And so, a monk is not allowed, without purpose, without compelling purpose, to dig in the earth. So, is growing roses for your lama to offer to them a compelling need? I would say yes.

I think so, and I do it. And I do kill some creatures. I like to think that I'm creating more homes than I destroy.

And I think that's true. So again, we're also not allowed to cut green plants without compelling need, because creatures might be living there. It might be somebody's home.

Tiny, tiny little creatures. Rose aphids creating... What's that called?

What do they call it? Some kind of rose disease that they cause on my roses. It's got a weird name.

It's like zyph or vlyst or something. I don't know, anyway. So, they might be living there.

Strip. Strip? I don't know.

You can write me a note later. Okay. This is interesting.

Monk Style 66, Depay Tung Je, which goes along with number 88, Sog chak dang chepay chu la long chupa. 66 is to knowingly use drink water or boil water or use firewood, which you know has small creatures living in it. Okay?

To burn a piece of firewood that you know has small creatures in it. Or to boil water that may have small creatures in it. Vowel number 88 is to use water for drinking that might have tiny creatures in it.

And there's a beautiful custom. If you're supposed to get water for the monastery from a stream, you're supposed to go in a group of like five monks to the stream. And then you're supposed to sit down and go around the circle and decide who's the most compassionate monk among the five.

It's very beautiful. So, you sit down and you say, okay, who's the nicest person here? Then that person has to go to the water and see if there's any little bugs in it before you take the water.

If they see bugs, then you can't take the water. Then in the old days, monks had to carry a chu tsak. Don't say chu tsak.

Chu tsak means a strainer, a small strainer. And in the old days, when you got your dingwa and your chu ge and you got your shampop and maybe your lama gave you this thing, I forget the name, tungak and your mulen, then you got a chu tsak also. When you got ordained, they gave you a chu tsak.

Nowadays we don't do it because the former manager of operations made sure the water was good. Okay. I got to time it, okay?

We don't have a lot of time. Now there's a whole set of monk's vows that relate to killing in the sense of killing an organization or killing the harmony of an organization. It's called yen je.

It is the nastiest karma you can make. It is considered a direct attack on the body of Lord Buddha. To cause a schism or to cause a lack of harmony in a spiritual organization or a group of spiritual people is considered in Buddhism to be perhaps the most dangerous karma you can make, the most severe karma.

Which means what? In our context, it would ruin your health. Something bad would happen to your health, okay?

You would forever have bad back or stomach problems or you might get cancer or something like that, okay? It's called gendun yen je. So there are a lot of vows about being careful not to cause and not to participate in a schism in a spiritual organization, okay?

Spiritual organizations are made up of, especially this one, of stubborn people, okay? You got to be stubborn. You can't go out and sit in the desert for three years if you're not stubborn.

And you can't serve them either if you're not equally stubborn. So we have a whole thousand acres of stubborn people. And of course there's going to be some, you know, friction.

When one irresistible force meets an immovable object, then there's friction, you know. It's really essential to keep good humor about it, okay? Disagree openly.

Disagree loudly. Yell in the board meetings, okay? That's fine, okay?

But have good humor about it, you know? Like, if you lose the vote in the board meeting, take it gracefully. Say, you're all crazy.

You're all stupid. You know, wait for six months. You'll see, you know.

But in the meantime, I will honor the decision of the board, you know? And I will honor the decision of the retreat director, okay? I may not agree with it.

They've been appointed by the board of directors and they have a certain authority. And you can, you know, you can make faces and you can avoid them, but you have to honor their decisions, okay? And that's just part of not creating a schism.

It doesn't mean you can't lobby against the decision in a nice, clean, healthy way, you know? You take other retreatants aside and you write notes about why we should be allowed to have pumpkin pies and then that's okay, without creating disharmony or bad feeling, okay? It's okay to be a politician.

It's not okay to be a divisionist, recidivist, I don't know. Okay. Anyway, here's a quick rundown of the...

I'm trying to time this, okay? A quick rundown of the vows that relate to creating a schism. Monk's vow number ten, which is a harkma, which means it's pretty serious.

Second level vow. Khangpe harkma. This is...

If there's a disagreement in the sangha about the status of a certain piece of property in the ownership of the monastery, and then if you choose to build a cabin or a meditation hut there, before the resolution of the disagreement you've broken one of the most serious monk's vows. So apparently that would cause a very serious problem among the monks, okay? You have to wait until there's a decision and it's clear that there's no problem, that the land is pure, okay?

There's a big deal in Vinaya about land having to be pure before it's used. If there has been some dispute or violence or other problems done on that land, the land must be purified before it's used, okay? Otherwise the whole thing gets crazy.

M11, kangchen gyi harkma. This is the same thing except a temple, to build a temple. So monk's vow number 10 relates to a meditation house for yourself.

11 relates to a temple for common use, okay? Monk's vow number 14, yen gyi harkma. Don't say, yen gyi harkma.

Yen means to divide the spiritual community, to cause a division, to create disharmony in a spiritual community, all right? And that's a hlakma, extremely serious, probably the most serious monk's vow, okay? That's an example of a vow which is a second category vow, which is more serious karmically than a first category vow.

Why is it included in the second category and not the first category? Because the second category emphasizes violations of the sangha's harmony in the sangha's community. So it was put in the second group, but karmically it's more serious than the first group, okay?

M15, yen gyi je su chokpay hlakma. Someone in the sangha is attempting to reconcile the parties who are having a division within the organization, and then you block it, and you thwart it, and you keep gossiping, and you keep trying to, you know, keep the, what do you call it, hornet's nest buzzing, all right? You didn't cause the, see, you didn't cause the original schism, but you seem to be invested in keeping it going, okay?

All right. Monk's vow 83, this is an interesting one. I think it might apply.

A monk breaks a tung je, okay? It's a tung je ba shik pa. Doesn't relate to a physical object, right?

A monk breaks vow number 83 if, out of feelings of disharmony, they refuse to engage in activities or eat in common meals with the other monks, okay? If, out of feelings of wanting to foster disharmony, they refuse to go to an activity or they refuse to eat together, specifically eat together with the other monks, okay? Then they've broken that vow.

MA RGOS PA'I TUNG JE This is an interesting one. MA RGOS PA means to display disrespect, to show disrespect. It means when the organization has, or the monastery has assigned you to a particular monastic duty, you don't refuse to do it, but you do it in a nasty way.

Like you make it clear that you're not happy to be doing that, okay? You disrespect the directive of your organization or your retreat director. They asked you to do something, and you do it because you know it's really bad not to do it.

But you make it, you growl a lot, and you make it clear to everybody that you don't feel like doing it. Then you broke that vow, okay? Then a monk has broken that vow.

Lastly, in the monk's vows, and then we'll rush on to the fourth vow, okay? By the way, I do have to go home on time. I got...

My time is my Lama's time, okay? I'm on Lama time all the time. And unless Lama specifically tells me they don't need me or don't want me around, I'm available.

And I sit there, and I'm available, okay? And I don't ask, am I going to be needed on such and such a day? Because that would be presumptuous.

So, I'm just there, okay? So, I have permission to be here until the end of the class. I tried to...

I heard there might be a reason why I didn't have to go, but it didn't happen, so I do have to go, okay? And that's a lesson maybe more important than all this teaching, okay? Okay.

Here's a whole bunch of monks' vows that relate to endangering your own life, okay? Undertaking actions which would endanger your own life. So, you're not allowed as a monk to undertake actions which would endanger your own life.

I was sitting with an unidentified-positioned corporate person talking about an unidentifiable project that I can't tell you about. And the meeting was set up in an unidentified city by an unidentified retreatant in a Prescott retreat, and is that vague enough? But anyway, I said, how did you meet the lady who's coming to my classes?

And they said, we skydive together, you know? And I'm like, people ask me, you want to go skydiving Geshe Michael? I said, no.

And they say, why not? And I say, I'm a monk. I'm not allowed to do things which are dangerous for fun, except surfing.

So, as an ordained person, you are valuable stuff. You are precious goods, and you have to be careful with your body and not hurt it. There's also a tantric vow like that, right?

You're not allowed to hurt your body because it's a temple, right? So, here we go. Monk's vow 81, pangpa saway tungje.

Monk's vow 82, pangpa tope tungje. This is funny. This is made for Geshe Michael.

After you eat your bowl of monk's food, you are not allowed to go looking for a second bowl. Okay? I mean, one bowl is big enough to feed three people anyway, okay?

Then I'll sit there, you know, I'll have dinner, and then I'll eat, you know, and then I'll have a loose schoolboy's cookies, or maybe I got some other cookies with frosting on them, and then I will eat one, and then I'll put them away, and then I'll get up and eat another one, you know, then I'll put them away, and then I'll finish off the whole thing, you know? Then you are endangering your health, right? You are endangering your body, okay?

What's the difference between the two vows? One is to actually eat the extra cookies. One is to try to get more cookies.

Okay? So we're busted either way. All right.

Monk's vow 92, monk's vow 93, monk's vow 94. 92 is mag la taway tungje. 93 is mag nang du nepe tungje.

94 is yul chukpe tungje. Mag la taway tungje means to leave the confines of the monastery walls to go be a spectator on a hill watching a battle between two armies that are fighting nearby. Okay?

You're not allowed to leave the monastery to go look at a war. Okay? Because it would threaten your health, okay?

If the war suddenly caught up with you. Mag nang du nepe tungje means you're not allowed to approach the trenches of a battle. And 94 is yul chukpe tungje means you're not allowed to be anywhere near a battle.

Okay? You have to take care of yourself. And don't put yourself in situations that are dangerous.

Bungee? Bungee? Bungee?

Bungee. Just nod. You don't know what I'm asking.

Jumping. Yeah, you can't do bungee jumping. Okay?

Monks Vow 107. Chu jepe tungje. I like this.

This is funny. A monk is not allowed to enter water that is over their navel. Okay?

And I used to think that was a stupid little vow, you know, because it's dangerous, right? Then we had a bunch of young monks from our monastery went down to the local stream and they went in too deep and two of them died because Tibetans don't know how to swim. And so that kind of rule was made.

So just don't put yourself in dangerous situations. It says, unless it's very hot outside. Okay.

Monks Vow 141. Nagmatapa lejungwe sorsak. This is a sorsak.

We didn't have many sorsaks. There's only four sorsaks. Category number four.

There's only four of them, so you don't get many. So here's one. You should be excited.

To enter a forest without checking carefully for muggers. Okay? That would be like walking around New York City late at night or something.

Or if there's a bear been spotted here. I don't know. There used to be a bear here that broke into the Lama house.

And if there's been a bear break-in at midnight the night before, you shouldn't be out walking with your schoolboy cookies the next night because he's kind of mean. No, it just means use common sense and don't put yourself in situations which are dangerous. People asked us to go to countries where people kidnap people.

Am I allowed to say the country? I don't know. It starts with kong and it ends with go.

And I said, we can't go. We can't go. I don't want to endanger my students.

The people who come with me, we don't want to be kidnapped. So many people have been kidnapped. Then there were other countries like that.

Monks Vow 253, that's the... That's the last one. He's right, but he's wrong.

DGOS PA MED PAR ZHING SDOM GANG YANG CHE GYI BSTAN DU RDZAS PA Say. Don't say. DGOS PA MED PAR ZHING SDOM GANG YANG CHE GYI BSTAN DU RDZAS PA To climb a tree more than a dom.

Dom means four trues. This is a true. It's a measurement, ancient measurement.

It's better than a tape measure, okay? Like if you've got to measure shoes or clothes. Learn to measure it with your fingers and your forearm.

Four of these is a dom. So I'm not allowed... If I'm six foot tall, I'm not allowed to climb a tree over six foot.

If you're seven feet tall, seven feet. Okay, like that. If you're Lama Christi, it's 12 foot.

Okay. All right. Last one and then we'll go on to the last vow.

We're doing pretty good. Don't say, It's a threatened word for tickling somebody. And if you...

So now you know why she's named that. GAGA You break a vow if you boisterously gaga another monk. Okay?

Tickle them too hard, all right? That's threatening their life, I guess. I don't know.

Okay. I just put that in for fun, okay? Somebody's going to ask you if you're a dame.

Do you know monk's vow number 110? And you're going to say, Oh, I know that. That's gaga.

That means I can't tickle other monks. I mean, you can tickle them lightly, but not strongly, okay? So, maybe someone can write a commentary on what's strongly and what's lightly.

He's going to do it, okay? When you finish it, you get ordained, okay? All right.

Monk's vow number four. I call it the great lie, okay? The great lie.

It is to lie about your spiritual life, okay? To make claims about your realizations which are not true. And the book goes into many pages of describing what kinds of things you could lie about.

The most serious one is called mi la chö. It means the highest realization. La means lama, right?

Highest. Chö means realization here. And mi means human.

The highest realization that a human can have which is the direct perception of emptiness, okay? So, this vow specifically relates to the direct perception of emptiness. And it means to claim that you have seen emptiness when you haven't seen it, all right?

If you have seen it, you know, okay? If you're not sure, you didn't, okay? So, be careful.

And that's a very... that's more serious than the first three vows, okay? That's more serious.

This is the most serious monk's vow. Why? The karma of keeping this vow is that you have realizations and you become enlightened, okay?

Direct karma, the direct karmic seed of keeping this vow is that you have realizations and you become an enlightened being who can serve the entire world, okay? So, to break this vow is very serious, okay? Keeping the vow about not killing gives you good health.

Keeping the vow about not committing sexual misconduct means that you will find a nice, beautiful partner. And then keeping the vow about not stealing means that you will always have financial independence, okay? The first three vows are cool.

You're like a fool if you don't keep them, you know? You could be financially independent, you could have a wonderfully strong body, young body, energy, and you could have a fantastic partner, okay? But the fourth vow is more serious, okay?

If you try to appear to be someone you're not, especially with your spiritual realizations, then you won't get enlightened, okay? You won't have the seeds to be enlightened, all right? Then the book goes on, the scriptures go on to say, this is especially true about claims that you have met special tantric deities or you have met enlightened beings or you have conversations with them every night or something like that, okay?

When you know that you don't, okay? If you think you are and you're not, you don't break the vow as well, okay? If you know that you're not and you say that you are, then you really broke the vow, okay?

That's dushetra, right? Then the book says an interesting thing. It says people who claim to have conversations with enlightened beings are implying that they've seen emptiness.

So that's an interesting statement, okay? I'm not going to go into it, but it's an interesting statement, okay? It becomes the fourth defeat, pamba, pepam, because you're implying that you saw emptiness, okay?

And why that's true, I guess we have to think about it. Maybe that could be a homework assignment for the next six months, okay? Something to think about, okay?

I'm going to do the leng shi, okay? It's kind of interesting. Remember something my Lama told me about this vow, okay?

My Lama went over this vow with me. My Lama said, when you are making claims about your spiritual life that aren't true, right? Then you are losing your connection with who you really are.

You see, you are not connecting with who you really are. You are trying to create sort of an armor or sort of a costume outside and it's not inside, see? When you make claims about yourself and your realizations that are not true, basically you are putting on a costume that's external to who you really are, right?

You want people to see this costume and you want them to think you are the person that you made the costume of, right? And so your focus, all the focus is not on who you are. The focus is on how people think you look, right?

And that's external to who you are. And then that blocks you from connecting with who you really are, all right? And my Lama said, you know, like, admitting who you really are and admitting your weaknesses and your faults, right?

Being very honest, not in a, what do you call, not in a low self-esteem way, but being very honest about where is my meditation at right now? How good is my practice? Am I really nice to other people or not?

Do I go back for a second bowl and a third bowl and a fourth bowl? Be honest about who you are. Then that makes you a higher spiritual person.

There's a very famous quotation, chibba chibba yinpa ma shepa lunpa re chibba kepa mayinpa shepa kepa re A child who knows they're a child is a master. A child who thinks they're a master... Sorry.

Yeah. A child who thinks they're a master is a fool. Okay?

It's a very famous quotation, right? Without having low self-esteem, be honest about where your spiritual practice is, and that makes you a higher master. To know your weaknesses and your faults, and to be frank about what you haven't seen makes you closer to seeing it.

And then inside you're a real mensch, and not outside, okay? You're connecting with who you really are, and that makes you a higher person. That makes you a better person.

That makes you more admirable. By the way, the lines I quoted, they go on to say that fools are impressed by outer appearance, you know? And then wise men are impressed by inner realizations.

You see what I mean? So, anyone who falls for your talk, your claims about who you are, and then sees you, you know, being nasty to people or to lie to people or to do weird things, then you just look like a fool. To someone who knows how a spiritual person acts, and you try to pretend you're a spiritual person, and you can't act that way, you just look worse.

You look worse than you would have if you'd been honest. You see what I mean? You just look like a fool.

You're a laughingstock. In English we say laughingstock. In Tibetan, if you're interested, they say kemo ne.

Kemo means laughing. Ne means object. Kemo ne means wise people just will laugh.

You say, oh, I saw such and such. Last night I talked to so-and-so. Yeah, but you were mean to three people like yesterday.

I don't believe it. You know what I mean? Okay?

Okay, here's the leng shi. de ne du re shik gi tse na dunpa sang gye u ma chen kyi trong gi chang chok shing shawa'i tsel na shuk so The Buddha was staying in a place called Umachen in a forest of shing shawa'i trees to the north of the city. de tse na mugay chenpo long mo'ay se nyepa kaway pa me kyang rang gi bu la se jinpa kawa chung ngo Then there came to be a very serious famine and even parents were unable to feed their small children.

de tse dunpay de ta mugay nyam rab chung gi kye chak nam nye du dang drog shen la tenpang ya ne kye long shik Then Buddha said, it's time to do the summer retreat, but we don't have food. The monks don't have sufficient supplies for everyone. So what I'd like everyone to do this year is to go to your home places.

Go back to the villages from which you came, where people know you, and do your summer retreat there and ask the people to support you, individually, because we can't collect that much money together for your food. nyapa lay rab tu chungway gey long ngap gye nyangway yul gyi nye ko du chupu chen ne yang ne pa kye lang so Then 500 monks who had been fishermen before they became monks went back to their fishing villages, and they agreed to do the summer retreat. It's called yar kye len.

Yar kye len means to make a commitment to do the summer retreat. de ne de dak gi drul che de dak chak druppa nyungway nye du nam la chukten par mi nyur kyi Then they had a discussion among themselves. We're not learned enough to impress our old neighbors.

We can't spout Dharma. We haven't been monks long enough to give good teachings that would impress our old neighbors. nyu kyi, nye du ongpa dak la So when our former neighbors approach us, kye ni nye pa lay par nye pa yin te de gyu sen gye lang di ni mi tape du she dang gye lang gi di ni korwa thada kyi du nge lak kyi rang shing chen kyi du she dang di ni nye kye chak lay nam pa du nge dak chokpa, you know, you should tell the neighbors, Oh, I've been living with this guy in the monastery.

He's unbelievable. He's overcome all his mental afflictions. He reached arhat a long time ago.

You tell them about me, and I'll tell them about you. Okay, got it? de ma tob shen du tobo she nye du nam la drape Then they made a big, you know, they told everybody they were like arhats and that they had high attainments when they hadn't.

nye du nam kyi rang gi bu le kyang trok de dak la jin no People had such belief in them that they took food out of the mouths of their children and delivered it to the monks. All right. de ne de dak gi yang dawa sum ne ne ga ye A magical word among monastics.

Ga ye means the end of the summer retreat. In the monastery, for two weeks after ga ye, you're allowed to do all this stuff that you're not allowed to do. Okay, like you're allowed to listen to the radio or you're allowed to go see a movie, okay?

So on the day of ga ye, at the break of dawn, 500 cassette players appear in the monastery by magic. Okay? And everybody's playing Jimi Hendrix and you know, it's really cool.

Anyway, so they had ga ye. They all let out. yangpa chen, they went to Vaishali, the great city of, Buddhist city of Vaishali.

ya ne khe lang ne druway gelong nam la nga gye jung tsul nam me pa Then the monks described, some people were talking about what the monks had done to get food. de nam la re khyo kyi de tabu yun den thob pa'am ser Then the other monks said to those monks, is it true that you attained those those realizations that you're talking about? ma thob It's not true.

We didn't attain them, okay? de nam la re khyo kyi sang sing chung tse tsam gyi chur du mi chu la me Don't say, mi chu la me, okay? Sorry, mi chu la ma me mi chu la ma Don't say, mi chu la ma me which means the human realization which has no higher.

anuttara, right? Nothing higher. Then the other monks said to these monks, are you telling me that you lied about being an arhat and an arya just so you could get something to eat?

They couldn't believe it. They're like, just so you could get some grub? You lied about being an arya?

len du rung yang, si mi rung yang, si de ni me so len du rung yang, si mi rung yang, si de ni me so Well, whether, you know, how do you say? Whether it was right or whether it was wrong, we did it. Okay, that was their answer.

Whether it was right or whether it was wrong, we did it. To impress people, right? genlong dun nyongwa dak chakway kap te chom den de la suwa Then the other monks, you know, they ratted on these guys to the Buddha.

jungwa di dang nang shi di kap dun kap di la gen dun duwa tse Then the Buddha called all the monks together. nyawa le rab tu chungway genlong nam la chom den de hi ka tsel pa Then the Lord Buddha said to all those ex-fishermen, kye kyi se chung se tsam gu chu du mi chu lama me lama me shin du me pa de nam tsupa me do to claim that you have reached some realization that you haven't reached in order to get some kind of, what do you call it? For some personal gain, right?

Or some kind of personal recognition from people, which is a lie, right? Like whatever recognition you're getting is a lie. So what does it mean?

What's it worth, you see? How long can you sustain that? He said, I can't believe you did that.

And he said, that's a bad thing and let's make a vow against it. So that's vow number four. That concludes the four vows which can cause you to lose all of your vows if you commit them, okay?

Here's the definition. Chenden gelong gi, a monk who still has their vows, rang ne gyu shenpa speaks to another person, okay? You can't whisper it to yourself.

You have to lie to another person, right? Lü ta mel du ne shing This is very serious ingredient of this vow and many other vows, okay? Lü ta mel du ne.

Don't say, lü ta mel du ne, okay? What it means is, most of the monks' vows have a small print on them which says, unless the other party is a divine being masquerading as a human, okay? Unless the other party is a divine being masquerading as a human.

This especially applies to the first vow, for example, okay? And it's true also in the case of a lie, okay? In other words, you must be conceiving of the other person as who they are to lie properly, okay?

If they look like a normal person who might be impressed that you are talking to, you know, Sarasvati or something, who tells you how to sing those jazz songs, you know, I don't do that, okay? I just play them badly. Then if you lie to them, it's not the same thing, okay?

They know you're not telling the truth, okay? Got it? DTAN NYID NA DANG LDAN DTAN NYID NA DANG LDAN means the other person must have five qualities.

These are very famous. A lot of vows depend on the other person having five qualities. Lama Chuky knows all of them, but for the rest of you, here you go.

First one is MI YIN PA, okay? MI YIN PA. They must be a human.

So if you whisper this to your favorite horse, it's okay, all right? Not as bad, okay? Still you're breaking something, I would guess, but not as bad, okay?

Secondly, MA SHES PA, and third is DUNG DGOR. Don't say MA SHES PA and DUNG DGOR. MA SHES PA means the person whom you tell the lie to must know how to speak.

They must be capable of human speech, okay? DUNG DGOR means they must be capable of understanding human speech, okay? The definition of a human in Buddhism is MA SHES DUNG DGOR, MA SHES DUNG DGOR.

It means someone who can utter human speech and who's capable of understanding human speech, unless they have a physical impediment or something. It's interesting because the Vinaya gives the reason for those two elements of that definition. MA SHES PA means if the person you tell the lie to cannot speak human speech, they cannot spread the word of your lie.

You see? They can't go telling other people, did you know that Geshe Michael can talk to Sarasvati and that's why he plays that particular song, DUNG DUNG DUNG DUNG DUNG, okay? And then DUNG DGOR.

DUNG DGOR means if you tell it to someone who can't understand your language, then there's no point to the lie, right? Okay, you tell them in French and they don't speak French, okay? So if they don't understand what you're saying, then you don't break the vow, okay?

Got it? All right. Number four, SABBA RANG BZHIN DUG GNAS PA.

This is very interesting. They cannot be insane, okay? They cannot be insane.

A lot of the vows that relate to lying require that the other person be in their right senses because if they're not, they won't really grasp what you're telling them, okay? If they're really crazy, they won't understand what you're saying exactly. They won't get a wrong impression and you're not lying, okay?

You're trying to lie but you're not doing a good job, okay? Condition number five, MA NING DANG ZAD NYID PA MA YIN PA SOGS They cannot be a hermaphrodite or a eunuch, okay? They cannot have both sexual organs or neither sexual organ, all right?

Why is that? A lot of the vows have this part. I guess there were a lot of eunuchs in ancient times, royal eunuchs, who were allowed to work in the harems because they didn't have a sexual...

they had cut off their sexual organ. Or there are people who are born with both sexual organs. Then it's said in the scriptures that those kinds of people who are not sure of their sexual identity, right?

They're not as capable of sustained thought. People who are confused about whether they're male or female are not capable of sustained thought. So if you tell them a lie, they won't really get it as clearly, okay?

This is not to say a person like a homosexual or someone who has kind of like both energies is not capable of sustained thought. I think Leonardo da Vinci and the guy who wrote the last song in the yoga class today, they were homosexual and they had a... maybe they had a little bit of both.

And Michelangelo, I think. So these people have... there are special people who have both energies in a strong way.

So I'm not talking... it's not talking about that kind of person. It's a person who's like fluttery and they don't know who they are and they're not capable of sustained misperception about you, okay?

So those are the five requirements. You worked me hard, these three. This is not...

this was not an easy term. Okay. du shi ma truway go ne.

The conception must be unmistaken. You must perceive of them as an English speaker and they must be an English speaker, for example, okay? Who you think they are, you must be correct.

kun long mi chud la me de ni dang rang mi denpa sheshin dzun ma du kyi. You must... now this is interesting.

You must lie intentionally knowing that you don't have that quality, okay? You must lie intentionally knowing that you're not an Arya or you're not an Arhat or you didn't speak to Sarasvati yesterday, okay, like that. You must be purposely misrepresenting yourself, okay?

So that kind of gets us off the hook if we think or we feel that we were talking to Sarasvati, okay? But we weren't, okay? Like that.

So that's not as serious. jorwa ngak tse ni ngang den shik dey drubpar me pe tse The thar tuk is when the other person understands what you said. They grasp the meaning of your words, okay?

The jorwa, the commission of the act is that you must... your speech must have the five qualities. So here's another five, okay?

Gelugpa's love, long list of numbers that stunned the audience into sleep, into sleep. Okay, we're almost there. No, you don't have to beat them.

That's okay. Okay. Number one, dey lang nga yin pa The speech must be verbal speech, okay?

I guess it cannot be a note or an email, okay? I mean, traditionally, it has to be spoken word. It must be the spoken word.

I don't know where audio is going to go. Okay. Rang gi yin pa It must be your own words.

I guess that implies that it's a lesser breaking of a vow if you ask someone else to say it about you. sel por ma gu You must say the words clearly. You can't say, I thought it was a lot funnier yesterday, okay?

And people didn't really under... You have to say very clearly, very distinctly. You know, I had a conversation with Sarasvati last night.

She told me we needed more practice. Okay. ma nor war mey pa means...

I don't know what that means. By the way, people have asked for this document, okay? It's about 70 pages of beautiful notes.

It's sexy. It's really good if I do say so. It came from hundreds of books and you're welcome to have it.

You won't understand it, but... No, I mean a lot of it is... There's English scattered around and you can figure out the rest, okay?

But it's very precious. It's a very nice document, okay? So I'll get you copies.

Maybe you tell me how many are necessary, okay? All right. So we'll skip that one.

No. ma nor war mey pa. You shouldn't make a mistake in what you say.

This means like you're in a rush and you say, I didn't speak to Sarasvati last night. But you meant to say, I did speak with Sarasvati last night. Okay, got it?

You said the opposite. And you didn't... Technically, you didn't lie.

But you intended to lie, but you're not very good at it. All right. That's with me and my mom.

I was like that. I couldn't lie to my mom. Anyway.

nun sum tu mey pa. It must be spoken directly to another person, okay? It can't be...

You can't say, can you go tell them? Or you can't... It has to be...

You have to be in the direct presence of the other person, okay? For it to be this kind of speech. Okay, I'm going to rush on to...

We're doing good. We're going to make it. We got like 20 minutes now, 25 minutes now.

I'm going to give you some related vows, okay? There's a lot. Yikes.

Ooh, maybe we won't make it. But I'll go over, because nobody can say anything, because I'm going to be gone. Okay.

Okay. M17. I'm going to give you some related vows.

Some vows that I think are related, and I think there's a theme behind them. Monk's Vow 17, which is a Lhagma, which means it's serious. Kalo me dewe Lhagma.

I hate this vow. Okay. A.

Refuse to listen to a reasonable correction. B. Try to turn it back on the other person.

It has two parts. Somebody says, you weren't supposed to mention all the things you mentioned during your class. And then you say, yeah, but in your class you did the same thing.

Okay? Which is illogical, right? I'm pure because you're impure.

All right? Okay? Actually, you're just saying, I'm impure and you're impure.

Okay? All right? Got it?

It's a very subtle monk's vow. It's very serious. It's one of the most serious monk's vows.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
Someone gives you a suggestion, and out of stubbornness you refuse to listen, and you even try to turn it back on them.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
I think these vows reflect human nature so beautifully, right? They were really written for us. I do this constantly, okay?

I do this all the time. Doesn't matter who tries to correct me. Even Lama, I will avoid Lama's corrections.

You know what I mean? So, it means it's something that we do and something we have to be careful. Shi me kyi hlakma.

Shi me kyi hlakma. Accuse another monk of a serious offense with no evidence. Okay?

You are judging another person. Okay? You don't have solid evidence about whatever you're accusing them of.

It's basically judging other people, making judgments about other people that you cannot substantiate. You have drawn conclusions without solid evidence about people, and we do it all the time. We do it every day.

Okay? That's a... What is that?

That's also a hlakma, hlakma number twelve, monk's vow number twelve. Then I thought to cover some vows which are beautiful because they are related to this vow because if you keep them, you will become what you are claiming to be. Okay?

I think that's cool. We should write a book. We should take this outline and somebody should make a book out of it.

It would be nice. This is a whole set of vows about how you could be what you're trying to show off that you're not. You see what I mean?

You're trying to... Wait a minute. That didn't come out too well.

You're trying to impress people by claiming you're something that you're not, and if you keep the following vows, you could actually become what you claim to be. How's that? Here we go.

Monk's vow number one hundred and twenty-two. LHAG PA GNYEN CHOG KYI MTHUNG BYED This is specifically to avoid the advice of your Vinaya master, and oftentimes it has connotations of they are asking you to study further and you refuse. Okay?

They give you advice that you should study further and you refuse. We had seven years at Diamond Mountain. We had very advanced classes.

We covered the deep secret teachings in detail, which hasn't been done in history, I don't think. But then I'm afraid a lot of people stop there and they're just rehashing it. You know what I mean?

They're kind of like... They teach sometimes, but they don't have any further contribution to make. You see what I mean?

They can rearrange it or they can spice it up or they can throw in some of their own lousy ideas, but you got to keep going. Okay? You can't stop.

It's an ocean and it's all beautiful. There's 200,000 Shakespeare books. Every one is incredible.

So don't stop. Don't say, I'm going to freeze in 2008 or something and rehash for the rest of my life. Okay?

You got to keep going. And you could say, I don't know, that's a lot of work. That's kind of hard.

I can't learn to read those books. You can. I mean, anybody can.

Okay? I've had people... I've taught people to read those books who couldn't finish high school or grade school or couldn't tie their shoes.

Okay? But they did it. And anybody can do it.

Anybody. Okay? You must keep pressing on into new territory, virgin territory.

Okay? Don't get stuck in what you learned five years ago or something. Okay?

Keep going. Become self-running. Learn to read them.

A little bit. Okay? I frankly wouldn't depend too much on translations or other people's rehashes.

I would rather... I don't read those. Ever.

I go read the original. You know? If I want to know the five qualities of speech, I go look it up in the original.

I don't believe anybody's rehashes like that. Okay? So you got to have that power.

And start. Okay? Just start.

The Sakya Pandita made his nephew learn one day... one word a day. The Sakya Pandita in 1200-something made his nephew, whose name was Pakpa, which was sort of...

what do you call? Optimistic name maybe. No, he probably wasn't Pakpa, but I mean he named him Pakpa, which is kind of a cool name.

Arya, right? And then he learned one word a day. Then he went to Mongolia and made it a Buddhist country.

And he invented the Mongolian alphabet. Okay? By studying one word a day.

Then he taught the Emperor of China. He became the personal lama of the Emperor of China. And Kubla...

what is his name? Who's... what's the guy that went across country from Italy to China?

Don't tell me. Just tell me. No, I don't know.

That guy... what's his name? Oh, you're trying to give me hints.

Eye? Ball? I don't...

I don't speak this thing. When I'm silent, I just... silent.

Marco Polo. Okay. Anyway, he met him.

Marco Polo met Pakpa. And he wrote about Pakpa. Okay?

So Pakpa studying one word a day became the teacher of the Emperor of China. That's cool. And brought Buddhism to a whole country.

It's still there. Monks Vow 35. Ser ngon lenpay pangwa.

Handle money without... without great purpose. I think we talked about that one.

We had a similar one. This is a little bit different. What it means is simplify your life and your meditation will get good.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
I think the most important way of simplifying your life and making your meditation good is to keep your room neat and simple.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
Every miscellaneous object in your room which you're not using, throw it in the bathroom. That's the only other room I have up there. I just close my eyes and throw it in the bathroom.

And then I figure somebody will clean it out later. You know? There's whole piles of junk in there.

But the other room is clean and neat. Okay? So it's very, very good for meditation.

Extremely good. Okay? You can't guess how cool it is.

Have the room be like a Zen temple. Hmm... sung tse chagway pangwa, sung tse lakpo tsulway pangwa.

It's a... A monk is breaking vows 38 and 39 if they own an extra begging bowl or 39 if they go looking for an extra begging bowl but don't get one. Got it?

Okay? You break your vows. Why?

Why? Extra stuff that you don't need. If there's something in your house which is not snow boots or a snow jacket or a snow hat and you haven't used it in six months, throw it out.

Got it? Okay? Your wife...

I don't know. Anyway. Hmm...

monks vow 47, sung jok gi pangwa. There are four versions of this. Monks vow 85 also relates to it.

lak nyag dang tsang tsu, dang shag dun, dang djen tsu. Four famous categories of food that you're not allowed to have in your house. Don't have extra food in your house.

Have enough to eat for the next week or two. Okay? Don't let unused food accumulate in your house.

Okay? It's a distraction. You'll never eat it.

You'll throw it out. Give it away to someone that can use it. Okay?

Don't keep food in your house that you're not eating.

[Speaker 2]
Okay?

[Speaker 1]
And you don't intend to eat. That applies to all the... like the last time you made Thai food and you bought all the ingredients and you got all these half-empty bottles of Thai spices.

Give them away fast. Okay? Hmm...

Monks vow 154. chak chu ta mang du mawa. Now I'm studying ngey jes, okay?

I'm studying ngey jes. Ngey jes are... point up or down.

High category, low category. Lowest category. Okay?

They are boo-boos. Dushkrtas. I think we should name somebody Dushkrta.

Anyway... I'm kidding. It's not your ordination name.

Don't worry. It just sounds cool to me. You're a real dushkrta.

Anyway... Maybe that's where it came from. No, I don't know.

But anyway... You're not allowed to giggle. You can laugh on the way out.

These are all... The following vows all relate to hurting your meditation ability. Okay?

They were written especially with regard to around sponsors or as you go to a sponsor's house or while you're at the sponsor's house. The first one, monks vow 154. chak chu ta mang du mawa.

chak chu... Don't say... chak chu...

It's a cool word. chak chu. You can remember when you want to criticize somebody.

You're doing chak chu. Geshe Lotar loves that word. You're just doing a lot of chak chu.

Chak chu means blah blah. Okay? We say blah blah.

They say chak chu. Don't go around chak chu. Chak chu means blah blah.

Just talk for the purpose of talking. Alright? It hurts your meditation.

Okay? It hurts your meditation. It's amazing.

My Lama told me... I don't know who she was referring to. She told me it's amazing how many people just talk to be heard and not because they're interested to have someone listen.

Okay. She's talking about me. Monks vow 155.

mik chok kun du tawa. That means when a retreat and especially or a serious practitioner is going somewhere, they should keep their eyes down. And they shouldn't be looking around and doing the 10,000 things.

Because then when you get home, your meditation sucks. It hurts your meditation. That's related to vow number 156.

nya shing kang le ring war ta shing dro. This is kind of beautiful. So, nya shing means a plow share.

A plow. And we plowed the monastery fields in India with a plow share between two bowls. And it's not a good thing.

Okay. It's really bad. But anyway, a plow share is about, not quite six feet long.

It's like four, maybe five feet long. A traditional Indian plow share, and you have to stand on it between the bowls to get enough weight. And that really is terrible because they poop a lot.

Okay. But we did it. A monk, as they walk down the street, is supposed to keep their eyes averted to the ground and not look ahead further than a plow share.

Not look ahead further than five or six feet. Keep your head down. You can keep your head up.

Keep your eyes down. And don't be staring around. Don't look further ahead than five, six feet.

It's bad if you're walking fast and there's a lot of telephone poles. Okay. DGON PA'I BRAL BANG Now we're getting into being a teacher.

Okay. By the way, I get to run over a little bit because you guys were late again, which is disrespectful. Okay.

To the Dharma. Not to me. Okay.

DGON PA'I BRAL BANG This is a very interesting rule. Monk's vow 44, BANG THUNG. If there would be any danger because of you're wearing your robes, you are required not to wear your robes.

Okay. If it would endanger you to wear your robes, you are required not to wear your robes, but not for too long. Okay.

Not more than, what is it? I think it's seven days or six days, you know. If it would threaten your life to wear your robes.

I've been in countries where I couldn't wear my robes. I might have been arrested. Okay.

Then, so you're required not to wear your robes during that time. This gets into the idea of morphing. This gets into the idea of morphing.

A Buddhist teacher, a person who's going to teach Buddhism, is encouraged by their vows to change their appearance to make the audience more comfortable. Okay. A Buddhist teacher is encouraged, even in the Vinaya, to change their appearance if that would make the audience more comfortable.

[Speaker 2]
Okay.

[Speaker 1]
So I think those of you, for example, who took ordination, there are times and there are places when if you show up with a shaved head, people will listen more carefully because you look like a monk or nun. There are also times or places where if you show up with a shaved head, you look like a Hare Krishna or something, and then they don't respect what you say. And if you showed up in street clothes, or in a cool yoga suit or something, people would listen to what you're saying.

So, you're actually hurting people if you refuse to change your appearance to fit their needs. A teacher is meant to accommodate the students' needs. You see, your job is to help them with what they need and with what they want.

It's not about what you want. Teaching means you're helping them. It's not about what you would like.

It's about what would be most effective for them. So, this rule relates to that. Mīccha Lama Denpa Mawa, Monks Vow 55, to describe your spiritual realizations, even when they are true, if it would not help the student in a major way.

Okay? That's interesting. Okay?

To describe your spiritual attainments if it wouldn't be of great benefit to the student. I'm getting now... I'm kind of winding down, okay?

Why? I'm directing the talk to teaching, to being a teacher, because my hope... I don't want to die with all this cool stuff, okay?

I got tons of this stuff. I got years more of this, decades more, okay? But I need to deposit it somewhere.

Okay? There has to be the next generation, right? Or there's going to be a problem, right?

So, I'm... I'm asking you to spread these kinds of teachings on, okay? Everybody says Vinaya is boring.

Did it seem boring to you? I've seen it was sexy, you know? I don't know.

I thought it was really cool. And especially if you can relate the Vinaya to people's lives, okay? So, I want you, whether you are ordained or not, I want you to pass on the beautiful principles that are expressed in these vows.

Then there's a certain etiquette, or there's a certain protocol to being the passer-on-er. And you should know that, because that's part of the vows, okay? So, the first one is not to talk about your attainments, even if they're true.

I do this, you know? I ask my Lama, what's the most important thing I should think about when I get up on the stage, you know? I thought they said, remember to cover your bald spot, you know?

They didn't say that. They said, think about what would help the audience. Think about what they need, okay?

Think about what they need and what they want and what's their dream, okay? Don't talk about what you want to talk about. Talk about what would be the most help for them.

See, I oftentimes go, I give a talk, I have to give a talk in X place, and people say, send the readings. You know, I send the readings. They're a 25-page reading.

I translate something fresh for them. I get there. Nobody's ready for that reading.

I just skip it. I pass out the reading and then I don't say a single word about it. I tell them about pens and four-steps and like that, okay?

Your job is to help them, not to show what you know, right? Not to put yourself up, okay? Okay, Gesukyi Tungje, Monk's Vow 57, to disregard any vow.

Oh, this vow doesn't, this vow's not so important. Okay, this vow I can skip, right? That six times book thing, I've outgrown that, you know?

That's not such a big deal. I know about that, okay? Like to disregard of any vow is breaking a vow, okay?

There's two vows like that. 130 is also like that. Monk's Vow 77, Joy to Chukpa, ask a nun to misrepresent you to a sponsor, to lie to a sponsor about you so you can look better, okay?

I suppose it works the other way around also. Monk's Vow number 9, this is a very, very serious vow, okay? And this is going to get me into another subject.

Let me see if I'm ready for that. Yeah, let's go there. Vow number, so now I'm on vow number 9, okay?

This is a hagma, which means it's very serious. It's called nyen je. Don't say nyen je.

Nyen je means a monk has broken a major vow. If a monk approaches a woman and says, I'm a monk and you should make an offering to me, a sexual offering to me, okay? I'm a special person and you should make a sexual offering to me, okay?

That's a very high monk's vow, high serious monk's vow, okay? What does that mean in the end? It relates to how you treat a student, okay?

What is the purpose of having a student? Why are you a teacher, right? And it gets into the use, I call it the use and the abuse of students, okay?

The use and the abuse of students, right? So, the purpose for having a student, the purpose of being a teacher is to help the other person, right? It's to help them get their dreams.

They have dreams in their life. I don't know if, you may believe it or you may not believe it, but 95% of people in the world, they either want financial security or they want good health or they want a nice partner, okay? So, to get them started, you should help them get those goals.

What you teach should be related to helping them achieve their dreams, their immediate dreams, okay? If you help them achieve their immediate dreams, then you can go on to help them achieve greater goals, okay? I don't think it works to get a bunch of people in a room and say, we're going to talk about how to become a Buddha on planet number 83, you know?

They won't come. And they won't come and then you failed as a teacher. It's like teaching Tibetan Heart Yoga level number 12 on the first day, okay?

Like, it's not used to them. They can't do it and they're not interested, okay? So, if you want to have an empty Dharma Center where four people come every week, then do that, right?

But otherwise, your goal as a teacher is to serve the students, right? And to help them to get what they need, right? And then slowly you take them up higher and higher, right?

But you have to build that trust. You don't build that trust if your motivation for teaching is mixed up with getting something for yourself, okay? I would like the teacher to pay more attention to me.

A lot of people teach because they want attention, okay? Like, I would like to be a teacher because I would like to have people think I'm special, okay? I think most of us, and I'm talking all of us, right?

I'm talking me also, all of us. We all have these weaknesses, right? We all would like to have attention from other people.

And so we work hard at being a special teacher that people will pay more attention to. And then we forget the reason why we're teaching, which is to help the other people, right? To give them what they hope for, to give them what they wish for.

So that's got to be in your mind all the time, right? I think there's a tendency among male teachers to want attention and to want sex, okay? And that's why it's a monk's vow.

I think there's a tendency among female teachers to want people's attention, people's adoration. I think sometimes you, I don't know, there can be sexual abuse from women also, okay? That they are using male students for the wrong reason, right?

That also happens. So I think you have to be careful to teach for the right reasons, right? And you are teaching for the good of others and you should teach in such a way that people are attracted to come to where you're teaching and teach, right?

So when we built Diamond Mountain, that was our vision, right? We had a vision where? To have a university where people could come and learn to be enlightened, right?

I think that was a mission statement or something like that, some grandiose thing like that. It was TUMCAN, I think. It was, we will supply you the necessary tools to get enlightened, right?

So the motivation for bringing, we chose to make a university and we wanted it to teach people about high spiritual things. You're not going to get this kind of talk anywhere in the world in any other university, right? Nobody's going to talk like this.

They'll quote it and they'll say, don't believe it, and then you'll have to have footnotes and you'll have to say which page it's on and you can write a graduate thesis about it and it's not going to be this kind of thing where someone's teaching you how to achieve the goals that you want in your life, right? And that's the purpose of Diamond Mountain. Diamond Mountain exists so that people can achieve their spiritual goals, okay?

And we chose a sunny place, okay? And there's a reason why it's in Arizona, okay? There was a certain kind of sunshine here and a garden here, okay?

And we're here. So we chose a sunny place, a place of sunshine and brightness and happiness, purposely. We didn't want to be in a dark place.

We didn't want Diamond Mountain to be in a place that was dark. We wanted it to be free and we wanted it to be bright and happy and open, right? Then that's our mission, okay?

And it hasn't changed. To be a place of hope for people, spiritual hope for people, and to be a place which is bright and happy and all golden sunlight, okay? Like that.

And that's the way it's going to be, okay? Personally, if... The giku, right?

The monastery disciplinarian always gives a threatening lecture at the end, okay? Sometimes it's an hour long. Everyone's asleep, you know?

And we're waiting for the guy to stop talking. This is supposed to be a place of great purity. People are supposed to study vows.

They are supposed to study what is proper behavior, what is good behavior, because that helps them and it helps other people. You cannot achieve your goals if you are not engaging in clean behavior and kind behavior, right? That's the purpose of having this place, okay?

Then, you know, I helped to found the place and I'm supposedly the spiritual director. Anyway, one of the spiritual directors. So I want to say that the place will be sunshiny and it will be pure and it will be clean, okay?

Even the tantric practice here will be sunshiny and pure and clean and bright. These four vows are the basis of all tantric practice. Everybody knows that, okay?

You're not a tantrica if you don't know that, okay? The behavior expressed in these four vows is the basis of all tantric practice, okay? There is no other tantric practice, okay?

And this will be a place of sunshine, okay? And light. And if it gets dark, you know, I will come and do a moon or something, I don't know.

Okay? If people don't follow the proper behavior, okay? I guess four things are going to happen, all right?

Number one, if you do something which breaks the rules of Diamond Mountain, the rules of Diamond Mountain are very clear. You can't hurt another student, okay? All right?

That's one of the main rules. Students have to feel safe here. And that's more important than the education, okay?

We defined that over the last ten years, okay? We realized that it was more important to provide a safe place and a secure place for people's study than it was to even give them an education. People have to feel safe here.

Which means that as a teacher, you can't abuse a student and you can't use a student, okay? You have to teach them and serve them and take care of them. They have to feel protected here.

So personally, if I become aware that one student is abusing another student, harming another student, or a teacher is harming a student, then I will... First of all, the Board of Directors will follow the mission statement and the rules of Diamond Mountain and they will stop that activity. Number one.

Number two, if that activity is illegal according to the laws of this country, then I will report it personally, okay? And we won't allow it here. We...

And you know we had problems with people with drugs and things like that. We made it clear. We had one person who was violent on the campus.

We took them to court and they were expelled from the country, okay? And I will do it again, okay? And it doesn't matter who.

If a person breaks the rules of Diamond Mountain or harms another person or breaks the law of this country, then I will... I personally will make sure that they are prosecuted, okay? And that they can't stay here, okay?

Because that's our rules. That's the rules of the place, okay? Then lastly, I will come to your retreat cabin and drag you out and I will spank you, okay?

And I promise you, okay? And I don't care about a time, okay? Vajrayogini is my friend, okay?

We're close friends, okay? If I hear that someone is mistreating another person, anybody, I'll personally come and spank you, okay? And it will be very embarrassing.

I'll probably bring a video crew. So this place should be a place of light, okay? And I'm not going to let it go any other way, all right?

Anywhere. As long as I'm here, okay? That's how it's going to be.

Okay. Anywhere. Okay.

That's all I have to say. You're like, whew, that's so good.