Вступление на срединный путь (текущий курс, Аризона), занятие 53

[Speaker 1]
Just to remind you, if you see emptiness directly in this light, then you get to see the day of your enlightenment. That would be funny. It's probably worth it just for that, to do this stupid Tibetan stuff.

I want to continue, if you don't mind, with the review. I think once a year is probably good. And I was trying to remember where we were, and I think it was around here.

The Three Kinds of Middle Ways. Okay. I think we have to unplug it, plug it back in.

Okay. This one here? Oh, sorry.

No, that's fine. We need to press the function key on the computer. No, that's what we need to do.

You can enable it. Yeah, okay. Let's just cancel it.

Okay, so there's three kinds of middle way. First is foundation middle way, which is emptiness. Halfway between what?

Middle way should be translated as halfway between, maybe.

[Speaker 2]
Right?

[Speaker 1]
Halfway between what? That's a viewpoint. No, see, that will come back, I think, state of mind.

But this is an existing... This is emptiness itself. One of the two extremes.

Existing blank or existing blank. What?

[Speaker 2]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
The lady at the ice cream shop, existing from her own side, is one extreme. And existing, not existing at all, if she doesn't exist from her own side, is the second. So that's halfway between for foundation middle way.

Then there's path middle way, which is direct perception of this foundation middle way. So path middle way, it's Australian too, right? Is resting upon...

I'm practicing, in case we do the Pacific Rim, we can include East Australia. Path middle way perceives foundation middle way, right? Okay?

The state of mind, which is between two extremes, perceives middle way. The emptiness. The lack of the other two extremes.

Okay? That's the word. That's the mind word.

And then result middle way is where you achieve... He gives the example of Nirvana, where you don't have anything left over. Do you know the...

Say Lakche. Say Lakche. If you don't talk, you don't get candy.

Lakche? It works for me. I thought it might work for you.

Lakche Nyangde. So Lakche means... Lharmadangchenpa means with something left over.

And Nyangde means Nirvana. So, what's left over? Some people say your body, right?

Your suffering. Your body that came from Bhagavata. So you're in Nirvana.

Your mind's in a perfect place, but your body... You still have this body which is kind of... It's like junk still left over.

It hasn't died off yet. But in the higher school sense of mind, do you remember? Did we get there?

It's in this book. Oh, it's kind of cool. Seeds that won't ripen.

Sorry, again?

[Speaker 2]
Seeds that won't ripen.

[Speaker 1]
Ah, no. It's kind of weird. They say you achieve...

You see, most people would say you achieve Nirvana with something left over first. And then you achieve Nirvana with nothing left over. But in Prasangika they say you achieve Nirvana with nothing left over first.

And then you achieve Nirvana with something left over. Do you remember? What?

Yeah, when you're in the direct perception of emptiness, you don't have baggage. And then when you come out, you have baggage again. So they reversed it.

It's that Nirvana. Anyway. It's this kind of Nirvana.

Maybe it's... No. It's...

It's path Nirvana. Anyway. And so he says when we talk about entering the Middle Way, as the title of the book we're talking about, we're talking about the Middle Way, which is the words used to express the Middle Way.

Okay. And Middle Way in the form of words refers to Arya Nagarjuna's original book. So when Master Chandrakirti says I'm going to write a book called Entering the Middle Way, it's entering how Arya Nagarjuna presented Foundation Middle Way.

Entering it. Okay? Got it?

Okay. Then there's a long debate about... Arya Nagarjuna's work doesn't directly mention the two wings of the bird.

Right? Compassion and an understanding of emptiness. But it's implicit.

When we did that... I think we can kind of skip through all that. Let me see.

This is interesting. Entering the Middle Way enters into Arya Nagarjuna's text by denying that something could grow from something else. Okay?

That anything could cause anything else. Right? Like...

Someone came to me with this quandary, you know. Should I get a job... I've been offered a job but it requires 40 hours.

And it pays really good. And there's this other job I could get where people would be talking Chinese around me but I'd make like minimum wage. But I could have my own hours, you know.

Which should I do? Because I'm broke. What's the assumption there about both of them?

Working makes money. Okay? You get money by working.

Both of them assume that. And that's one of those diamond dealing things, you know. It's positing two choices.

Both of which are false. Money doesn't come from working. We have a business seminar for EBI called Money Doesn't Come From Working.

You don't get money by working. Which most students in our university are proving.

[Speaker 2]
But...

[Speaker 1]
But... But yeah, you get... I went home.

I gave this person this complicated advice and then I went home and I thought I screwed up. They tricked me. I should have told them just help.

Help more people. Help out. Be more...

Not just generous. We tend to give away all our money and then be broke. It's more like take responsibility.

Like you guys did in Australia. They have this diamond mountain and they have retreat center and they have a diamond center. And...

And it's not like they gave money to a diamond center. They took responsibility for the whole shtick. They just took responsibility for it.

So, you know, whenever they're in a financial crisis they have to fly back and clean it up. That means they have responsibility. And I think it's more like that.

It's more this attitude that I'll take responsibility for someone else's welfare. You know? And then the money just comes from that.

You see what I mean? Money comes from that. So...

What it... So, doesn't that cause money? Didn't I just say that causes money?

I did. And it does cause money. I can tell you that.

But this says things don't cause anything else. Things don't grow from something else. Was I wrong or is he wrong?

[Speaker 2]
Things don't grow from something else. You're both right. No, they're both right.

They don't grow from something else inherently. They're by definition.

[Speaker 1]
You know, they don't grow from the things you thought. It doesn't come from working. It doesn't come from working.

Some people work like crazy and they die before the paycheck is cut. You know? Alright?

And then other people don't work and money just comes in. Okay. But they must have taken responsibility for somebody before.

Okay? And then they take a lot of trouble to refute the mind-only school. And then it goes on to demonstrate how nonetheless all the workings that cause and affect are perfectly reasonable.

Okay? Meaning, you collect good karma and money comes. That's fine.

And when you teach emptiness, if you can shock people into thinking nothing exists or nothing causes anything else and then take them that second step, but everything still works fine. That's very important because most people don't go the second step. Most people just leave them with the first step.

Oh, you know, nothing exists, everything is an illusion. And then they leave, you know, and they don't tell them about the karma thing. Okay.

I like that karma and emptiness has become just part of everybody's vocabulary. And they don't notice it anymore. It was invented in North Carolina at the...

Is it Kanapa Center? I don't know, 1998 or something, 1997. Right?

The marriage of pramana. Now everyone uses it. We were in Taiwan and this guy was driving us around and we asked him, what's the word for mental sleep?

Right? In Chinese. And he gave us the word and I don't remember, do you remember?

But he said, you hear it all over Taiwan now. And... First he told us the word and then he was driving, he kept driving and then he said, by the way, everyone uses this word now.

You know, I just planted a dinger winger in my mind. And then, and then like five minutes later he turned around and said, and that was coined in the Diamond Cutter. The person who translated your book made up a new word for that.

And now everyone uses it in Taiwan. It's really cool. Okay.

It wasn't dinger winger. It was more like Tuan Ma. What is it?

Say it.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
Ming Ying?

[Speaker 2]
Ming Ying.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. That was it. It was close, dinger winger.

Okay. You look like Ming. It's the same.

Ming. Ming is the name. Here's a nice part.

Those of the lower way and those of the higher way are completely equivalent in the sense that to reach either Nirvana or Buddhahood they have to see emptiness. So he's selling the idea of emptiness. And I think that's maybe what the a lot of our projects, maybe the SIE, the Christian project, I think is to try to sell people the idea that and it came does it come in your book?

Even good deeds done by a person without understanding emptiness cause them suffering. Where was that? Oh, it was in his other book.

Yeah. It's a verse out of The Letter to the King that we did on the in Tucson. But the idea Arya Nagarjuna states in that book and it kind of gets watered down in later centuries.

He states directly the verse says those who do good deeds without an idea of emptiness will suffer. It's like that. It's very strong.

So even if you just want to be happy but you don't want to save the world. Even if you just want your own mind to be contented. It's impossible without understanding emptiness.

That's the that's the that's what he's saying here. Cannot do it. Won't happen.

What's that mean? In my personal life it's that every time I'm unhappy it's because I'm not being aware of karma. You know?

My It's very important that unilateral thing. This person is making me unhappy. I mean that itself is a for a Buddhist that's a that's a falsehood.

What do you call it?

[Speaker 2]
Fallacious.

[Speaker 1]
It's fallacious, right? Nobody can make you anything. You know?

It's all coming they came from you so you're making yourself whatever it is. But and my response to that they are unpleasant today. They did say something mean to me or do something mean to me today.

People did criticize me today. But but what should my reaction be? You see?

And then it's just Ken Rinpoche used to look you in the eye and say, be happy. And you're like, this guy's screwing me. Be happy.

You know? It's like, yeah, but be happy. Go away.

I'm watching baseball. You know? And there is a it's very difficult.

But the idea is that you won't be happy until you realize that to respond in any other way than being happy or kind is just gonna keep them in your world. So if you don't like this bad stuff happening to you then stop it from your side. Take responsibility.

Just stop it from your side. Don't wait for them to change. They're not gonna change until you change.

You change first. Then there's this time gap during which you're being nice and they're not being nice. And then they change.

That's all. So yeah. If you can't be happy, at least be peaceful.

At least let the mind rest. Let it relax. Let it find some kind of quiet peace.

There's still crap going on around you. And then you you just put your mind in some kind of peace and leave it there. And then you're not making new bankruptcy.

And then the cha chong Say cha chong. Cha chong. Cha chong.

Cha chong is not the name of a city near Chengdu. That's Chongqing. Cha chong means Cha chong means blah blah in Tibetan.

Blah blah. So there's still gonna be cha chong going on. There's still cha chong.

Still people are cha chonging you. And then from your side you're just quiet, peaceful, relaxed. In your mind.

There's still tension in the air around you and all that. But you're happy. You're quiet.

You're at peace. And then you make new good karma. And then the cha chong goes away after a while.

Because that's just an echo of the bad stuff you did before. Right? So you can't stop unhappiness unless you're happy.

Okay. Easy this thing. And this is interesting.

Those at the lower way they just sort of they kind of get emptiness sort of roughly and then it's enough to get them to nirvana. Those at the greater way they're trying to reach the point where they can influence all the beings on a billion planets sitting in Buhi or Asama. Okay.

They're trying to reach a point and it's done through the naval chakra by the way. So Duke Dharamitra's second series. Hip openers.

What? Hip openers are going to help me stay on a billion worlds, right? Yeah.

Exactly. And that chakra emanation chakra Drupal Krama it slowly opens and like a portal and then you can experience how your activities in Dharam are affecting millions of worlds at this moment. And that's really fun.

Alright. Oh and then it says something else, right? This is very famous.

Say Rigpa Thaibe Gone. Rigpa Thaibe Thaibe Gone Gone Let's do the whole thing. Rigpe Rigpe Namdang Namdang Thaibe Thaibe Gone Gone This is misspelled.

I'll just fix it. One more time. Rigpe Rigpe Namdang Namdang Thaibe Thaibe Gone Gone Rigpa means in Ladakh they would say Rigpa.

What does that mean? Sorry? Yeah.

It means family or it can mean logic. Okay. It can mean argument.

Logical argument. Then Namdang You know this word from Chomden De Chukin Namdang What's Chukin Namdang? Chukin Namdang means all the different kinds of stuff.

Rigpe Rigpe Namdang means all the different kinds It can mean synonym by the way. Namdang But Rigpe Namdang means all the different kinds of proofs. Thaibe What's Thaibe?

Infinite. Infinite. No end.

Ta means end, right? Like Tar Chin means going to the end. Thaibe means no end.

It's probably similar to the Y-E in Yeshe. Like endless wisdom maybe. So Rigpe Namdang Thaibe Gone means what?

Gone. By means of or via or through through the medium of or whatever. So by using infinite numbers of logical proofs for what?

Emptiness. Emptiness. Yeah, so You know, people say Are you Mahayana?

And Geshe Thottam Rinchen spoke about this in the last time we were there. People say Are you Mahayana? And they say Yeah.

And they say Why? And they say Because I'm trying to be nice to everybody. But what would it be in this context?

Are you Mahayana? Yes. Why?

Yeah. I like to hear different proofs for emptiness. Like I already know 23 and I'm learning more.

Right? Do you know Dorje Tsegma? Or Do you know Tashi Number Tele?

Or Do you know Yume Gobi Tensei? Or Do you know Chittam Duma Tele Tensei? Or How many arguments for emptiness do you know?

You see? And then if you want to know if you're Mahayana by nature is you're calm Mahayana you're attracted to new arguments for emptiness. That's Rikpa Rikpa Number Tele Gobi And you can't get enough of them.

Like some people crave for chocolate in countless different formats. Like you know it could be dark chocolate it could be Anatole and you have this new milk chocolate without milk and it could be Hershey Kisses it could be what is it called? Chocolate Constellations You know and this could be dark chocolate or bitter chocolate or Cadbury's in China She turned to me today so sweetly and said the only good thing in China was that I you know I went for two months with the bed bugs and I'm like she's gonna say it was me you know and she said that Cadbury chocolate we brought.

So some people just just thinking about chocolate in different formats you know but a Mahayana person they're like wow give me one more reason why the lady at the stop and go stop and shop stop and shop

[Speaker 2]
store and more

[Speaker 1]
after folk tune they're gonna call it no stop no go but but yeah a hundred reasons why why she doesn't come from her own side a hundred reasons why we're not gonna be disappointed if she put the ice cream away before we got there okay

[Speaker 2]
that still doesn't work

[Speaker 1]
oh we talked about Chedi Jagad Doja people for whom a book was targeted people towards whom a book is targeted and and that's the idea that people like Maitreya who he's talking about right here Lord Maitreya targeted his famous book Mundo Gen Abhisam Avogadro Ornament of Realizations for like people who could with a single book understand emptiness get emptiness with a single book but but it tells us something about how we should be you see you get up to give a talk you should target it you should look out at the audience or you know study the audience before you get there find out who they are and then do the Buddhist Chameleon thing you know like target what he's saying by target means don't just get up and talk you know like think about who they are and what language they need and then change it adjust your language to them right and then as you get better at that you can attract varying audiences you can help more people and I think there's a tendency in Dharma circles to get stuck in one I call it almost Dharma East it's like a language which is constantly using foreign words like if you want to get Ngengyum you're going to have to work on the first step of Bodhicitta and then Shunyata will overcome your aversion to Samsara you know and then no and then this person has already six foreign words and they're like you know ah you.

you just put six obstacles in their way right so you're not targeting them because you're not thinking about them you're just thinking about yourself you know you're just thinking about what you want to say so first thing you do you sit down my Lama used to say I used to say what am I supposed to say what should I think about and say say something that helps them for God's sake you know first thing you do when you sit down you come out from the backstage at Taipei City Hall you know you come out with yak pen and you walk out there and you're like oh my God you know it's like this it's like a football stadium you know and then the first thing you do you sit down first you find a chair try not to trip and then then you think what would help these people before you open your mouth and say it to yourself what would help these people you target okay and books too when you write a book you have to be right there before you lay the pen to the paper or before you translate something you have to think who's this for you know who what audience is this for and then make it for that audience okay and there can be different audiences you can have a a technical Buddhist translation which will please Gene Smith in art and somebody else probably or or you can make a what do you call it a mass a mass a mass market book but specifically it has to have a clear focus like who's it gonna attract like when we work on new books with different people now which is very pleasant to do collaborations with other people and and we all sit down first and say who's it for you know and that's very important so target target teachings hmm why do you think they call teachings on Bodhicitta far-reaching yeah they affect infinite number of people and and as I said I think as your yoga gets better and as your practice gets better you can make contact with your navel chakra and you can make contact with with the effects that your life is having in other worlds and then then you I think you appreciate the expression far-reaching okay say which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is which is I think it's Gumby I can't I haven't found one yet okay anyway this is interesting because he gets into the difference between literal and figurative right? and every time you target for an audience who is less than a diamond mountain audience audience, you'll be speaking figuratively. And, no, and then when it all goes up on the web together, they'll figure out that all the other teachings don't sound like the ones from Diamond Mountain.

And they'll think you're either crazy or, you know what I mean, or it seems inconsistent, or you said everything is empty but now you say only half the things are empty, and like that. And then, so I think in your own life, a natural result of targeting certain audiences is that there will appear to be inconsistencies, or people will think you're crazy is what I'm saying, you know. And, you know, you could be like Arya Nagarjuna, people say there must have been two, because there's this one who wrote all the emptiness books and then there's this tantric one who wrote all these tantric texts, and they're so different that it must be, and no, they'd spend hundreds of pages proving that there's two Arya Nagarjunas.

Or you can just think, when you see a teaching like that, when a when two of your lamas seem to contradict each other, then you have to work on figurative, which one is being figurative. You have to struggle with that. It's a test something.

All lamas do that. Single lamas do that, and then every pair of lamas do that. Okay.

Oh, cool. Did we get this far? I don't know.

Oh, we did. Yeah. Honoring great compassion without dividing it, and honoring great compassion without dividing it.

Maybe I should go find it. That's where we were supposed to start tonight. Okay.

Then it's kind of confusing. What does it mean honoring great compassion without dividing it, and honoring great compassion with dividing it? He's talking from the root text, Master Chandrakirti's text.

And then we made a decision that's going to cost us a year or two. We decided to translate the root text as we went along. And we've been doing it.

But I think it's time to do some cleanup work. I think we should take all the pieces of the root text out of the commentary and put them in one place. Because it won't be consistent.

The verses will sound different. They won't be the same rhythm, the same meter, the same style, because one was done in 2004 and one was done in 2007. You know what I mean?

So I thought maybe tonight we get the root text into a document. This is the root text. And I think we would clean it up.

So I did a macro at one point for, let's see if it works. Is that on? Okay.

That sort of cleans it up. And I think we'll just start, we'll start a second book, which is the root text. So help me.

I don't know. Ben Craver. Translate the first one.

Yeah, quote. It's just a quotation mark. So what's shuk mean?

Shuda. Somebody comes in, say shuda. Shuda.

Somebody comes into your house, into your cell in the monastery, and you say shuda. Shuda means have a seat. Shuk, sit.

Have a seat. It's another version of juk. Once you've entered, you can shuk.

Okay. Okay. So here in contained.

What is it? In Sanskrit, is it let's read it together. We'll do this part in a minute.

Just the top line. Okay. By the way, those of you who are new, we're learning to read both the Roman transcription and the Tibetan script.

Okay. And it's funny, we're in China, right? And for years, I think it's been about 25 years, we've been trying to sell Tibetans on the idea to type the Roman in the Tibetan script.

And then we went to China, and that's what they do, actually. They type the pinyin. They type the sound, basically.

And then three characters come up, three choices, and then they click on the right one. Because there's 72,000 characters, or something. So, you know, how are you going to put that on a keyboard?

So, you know, this lama from Vajrapani wanted a book from me this weekend. He needed it in a hurry. He's like desperate for it.

He emailed me, called me. This other, Kyongla Rinpoche wrote me, he needs a book. He said, I couldn't email you because I had to write the name of the book.

You know what I mean? And so, like, a whole people is like not able to communicate with each other because they're waiting for... You've got to do it like this.

So, you should learn to do this transcription thing. Because in the future, even if Unicode will come out, every language in the world will be on your computer. But you're still going to have to access it with Roman letters.

Typing. You're going to have to hit Roman sounds. That's the way it works, even in China.

So, learn to read it, because that's what you're going to input, even 100 years from now, when they got Tibetan letters in the computer, which they will in about two years or five years. It's already finished. Okay.

So, here we go. One, two, three. Gya-ga-ra-ge-du-la-gya-ma-ga-pa-ba-ta-ra-na-ma What's gya-ra?

Gya means big, like Gya-tsong. Like His Holiness, he stands in Gya-tsong, right? Big water, which means ocean.

Da-lai is the Mongolian word for ocean, right? So, gya means wine, which is big. And then, ga-ra came from scar, which means white.

And it was because people in India, when these words were invented maybe 2,000 years ago, wore a lot of white cloth. So, it's a big country where people wore white cloth. But in China, they still favor, and they look very cool in black clothes.

So, that's called Gya-na. Big country where they wear black, Gya-na. So, Gya-ga-ra, say Gya-ga, and Gya-na.

So, Gya-ra-ge-du means, in the language of India, we call this book Madhyamaka Avatara-na-ma, okay? And whenever you see a Sanskrit title, you have to check it, okay? So, I'll turn you on to something.

This is a really beautiful dictionary. It's 20 volumes. Some guy sat in India for about 25 years, and he made a dictionary of Tibetan and Sanskrit.

It's Tibetan to Sanskrit. And he just sat there for 25 years, and he got all the books that are still available in Sanskrit, Buddhist books. And he sat there, and every time he found a new word that was in Tibetan, he made his dictionary.

It's about 20 volumes. And now we have it online. First, we typed it in illegally.

I was just using it personally, which is legal. So, it wasn't illegal. But then John Brady met him.

He's very old now. He's close to 90, I think, and asked him, could we get the copyright to give away the electronic version? And he said, cool.

And he's done it. It needs a little work. It needs a little cleaning up before we can release it by people who know Sanskrit and Tibetan.

And it would be a huge job. I think we could get a grant for it, actually. So, I was thinking about it for certain people.

It's just a way to... It's a tremendous contribution to the world. Because then later we can put the English in.

And it would be the best documentary ever. I'll show you what it's like. So, we go like this.

I just want to make sure he's spelled my marker correctly. Madhyamaka. So, I typed in Uma.

Because I'm checking to see if his Madhyamaka is correct. Because you hear people say Madhyamaka. You hear people say Madhyamakai.

Let's check. There's all the choices. Madhyamaka or Madhyama.

But there's also a Madhyamika. You see? But there's no what?

Madhyamaka is not an option. Okay? Now, right here you can see why we need someone to help work on the dictionary.

He says Uma. He gives the Tibetan, right? And then he gives three Sanskrit equivalents.

But he doesn't mention, he doesn't repeat the Tibetan before each one. You see? So, when you put all the words in the alphabetical order in reverse, you can't do it.

There'll be no Uma next to the second and the third entry here. You can't create, you can't interleave his other 18 vines with his first vine. Because he started over with each of the vines.

You see? So you can't collate them until somebody puts Uma in front of two and Uma in front of three. It won't work.

You see what I mean? Somebody has to help do that. It'd be a great contribution to the world.

But anyway, there's no Madhyamaka there. It's either Madhyamika or Madhyamaka. Okay?

And then here what's it say? Madhyamaka. Madhyamaka.

So, anyway, you gotta have a long A in the front. If you're gonna have a long A, it's gotta be in the first syllable. Okay?

Madhyamaka. Let's check that. Let's make sure.

Before we change his book. Madhyamaka. Madhyamaka.

Madhyamaka. Madhyamaka. Okay?

Those are the choices. This is something. So no long Madhyamaka.

Madhyamaka Alankara. Madhyamaka. Let's look up Uma Lajupa and see what they say.

By the way, this is how we correct your mantras in your empowerment text and stuff. It takes like six weeks to do all the mantras in the empowerment text. Madhyamaka Avatara.

Okay? So that's correct. So there's no long A's here.

So we're gonna fix the Tibetan. Madhyamaka Avatara. Should we put a long A here?

Son of Tara? Well, yeah, we'll go sit somewhere else. Anyway, Madhyamaka Avatara or Avatara.

Ava is the prefix Ava or Ava. If the two A's come together, it goes long. Madhyamaka Avatara.

But if you split it, it's Madhyamaka Avatara. Okay? He split it.

The Tibetan split it. So we'll let them keep it. Okay?

And is it Avatara or Avatara? It's Tara. Okay?

And is Nama with a long A or a short A? Do you say Namaste or do you say Namaste? And is that name?

Hmm? It's long? Do you say Namaste?

It's Namaste. That means to bow down, Namaste, right? But the ancient meaning was, I bow down to your name.

But let's see. We'll look up Nama. And we'll look up Nama.

Near the Tibetan word, which is what? Maybe we won't get all the answers. How do you say mean?

What is mean in Chinese? Okay. Okay.

What is mean? First word? Mean?

But it's a sudden move together or something like that? Okay. Should that mean jaw?

Anyway. It's neither. Did we misspell it somewhere?

Is it neither Nama nor Nama?

[Speaker 2]
Huh?

[Speaker 1]
Oh, good. Or a T maybe. I mean an S.

Let's try Nama. Yeah, there you go. Nama.

Sankirti. That's in Manjushri's thing. So anyway, it's Nama.

So he's okay. We'll let him go. So, how are you going to translate this?

In the language of India, this book is known as what? Madhyamaka Avatara. Okay?

And Madhyamika is okay. You can say Madhyamika. I'm going to put back this because everyone's doing it.

Okay. There's a reason. I mean, which brings me to another point.

In Tibetan, there's no two letters for B and V. You use the same letter, B. Bah.

Say Bah. Because there's no V in, there's no V sound in Tibetan. There's no V in any word in Tibetan.

And that's also the case in like Bengal, certain parts of Bengal. They don't distinguish between a B and a V. So they'd say Bajra for Bajra.

Okay? Like that. And it would really sound like, what's up?

And so, in Sanskrit manuscripts from Bengal, you get a B sometimes, and you get a V sometimes. They use them almost interchangeably. But the rest of Sanskrit and the rest of India, they're very careful to distinguish between a B and a V.

So the Vajrayogini Tantra came into Tibet, and her most important sound of all Vajrayogini, the whole Vajrayogini Tantra, thousands and thousands of pages and books can be summarized in a single sound, Vam. Say Vam. That's her.

In essence, that is her. If you just know Vam, you know everything. Really.

So what happened in Tibet? It got changed to Vam. Because they didn't have a V.

So for 39 generations, it's been Vam. And now you're gonna correct it to Vam. Okay?

It's what it's meant to be. It's very beautiful. It's the V for Vajrayogini.

And it's the V-A-M for Vama, Marga, the left-hand part. And it's Vam for Fem. Which is where feminine came from.

They're all the same. They all mean the same thing. The left-handed one was the woman.

So Vam, Vamapada, which is very famous in India, the left-handed Tantra, which is Vajrayogini. It's Vam. You see?

And if you tell that to Tibetan, they won't be impressed, because they can't say Vam. Remember Thay would say, go drive the Van here. Because they do have a W.

You know what I mean? Anyway. It's like us trying to pronounce Chinese right.

Alright. So you're gonna say Avatara, right? Avatara.

Okay. Phuketu, which means what? In the language.

Why is it called Phuk? Why was Tibet called Phuk? What does Phuk mean?

It's a verb. To shout. Yeah, to shout.

To shout. And then it, even the word Tibet, the bat in Tibet is a corruption of bhut, which is corruption of bhut, which means to yell or to shout. And the idea was that India is the land of the Aryas, so it's the holy land.

And it's within a stone's throw of Tibet. And in Tibet, the way you say within a stone's throw, you say within calling distance. So Tibet is called Tibet because it's within calling distance of the motherland, the holy land.

In the language of Tibet, this book, it is known as what? Say this one for me. The one at the top.

One, two, three. jang pa shö nö chö pa la chak chelo Don't say sel. Chak chelo.

It's an ancient form? Now as an editor of ACIP text, you have to imagine what does cha look like? What does cha look like in Tibetan?

Yeah, it looks like your two Ida-Pingala connecting joint down four stories below your navel, right? And what does sal look like? Same thing with a little tiny flag on it, which often gets chipped off in wooden wood blocks.

So then what do you do? You just go correct it. It just chips off.

So shouldn't the Tibetan typists have typed sal? They've done it a hundred thousand times. Shouldn't they just type sal?

They're under very strict instructions. You don't correct the text. You don't guess what chip fell off.

You just type what's there. Because then it would get crazy. Then every little typer guy in Hunsur, India would say, I think this should be this.

And then people see the data and they say, you're crazy, it says chak chalo or your people don't know chak chalo from chak salo. And we're like, no, the idea is to input what's there. Then somebody else has to come and correct it.

But the idea is to input what's there. And people didn't get it. For a long time, people still don't get it.

If they start correcting things, then rare words will get lost. And unusual words will get lost. And beautiful ancient differences will get lost.

Like Geshe Michael taking out the long A from Madhyamaka. OK. I think we did this.

I'm just going to check. No. OK.

So what's chak salo? I bow down. You can say I make prostrations, but it's just not in the current English.

Prostration means heat prostration. Or prostate gland problems. It's not in current English.

When you respect somebody, you bow down. You can say obeisance, but if you Google that, you'll only get three hits. I mean, use languages that people know.

Make it comfortable for people. I bow down to jampel. What's it spelled?

Jampel. And then it's understood it's jampel. Gentle voice.

Who is a shunu? Where's shunu bow? Where's shunu?

Youthful. How did you translate it? It's kind of cute.

What did you say? As a teenage boy. You want to put it?

Is it OK? Can I borrow it? In its form.

As a teenage boy. Is that OK? Which one?

[Speaker 2]
As a Adolescent? Teenage is kind of like teeny bopper or something.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, I don't know. Adolescent is even worse, I think.

[Speaker 2]
Young man? Young man.

[Speaker 1]
Too old. Really. He's got to be 16.

People only call you young man when you're 16 who are trying to tell you they're trying to be pensionizing young man.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
One more to go. Can you catch? OK.

That's hard to give up. We have to say goodbyes. Right?

We have to say goodbyes. The panda has to go. The panda girl.

You have to give it to her afterwards. And then we have twin dragon almond cookies. I don't think they have any fortunes.

Maple cream cookies. If you're ever in a three-year retreat, who was crazy about the maple cream cookies? The rabbit.

Rabbits in Arizona's desert like maple cream. And once they eat them for a week they won't eat any other kind. They come up to the door and they bang on the door and you open it and they're like...

Then you go like that and you hear these cookies. And then you have a cookie and if you try to pass off a non-maple cookie, they like sniff at it. Then they kind of touch it to their mouth and then they just sniff away.

And they sit there. I'm telling you. Let's read this one together.

This is four lines of poetry. So, Lesson to Milarepa, we're gonna read it in what kind of rhythm? Pairs.

Okay, in pairs. If there was no milarepa, it would be da-dum. Da-dum, da-dum, da-dum.

Da-dum, da-dum, da-dum. And then the first Venerable Lama stole that. Okay?

So, okay, so you gotta do the da-dum thing. With a full mouth. One, two, three, NYE THÖ SANG GYE RING NA THUB WANG GYE SANG GYE CHANG CHU SEM PA LE CHUNG SHING NYIN RJE SEM DANG NYI SU ME LO DANG CHANG CHU SEM NI GYAL SE NA KI GYUR This is a section that we've already translated.

And so, this is where we're going to start putting together our second book, right? The Sketchy Michael System. When you figure out the first book's going to take you 26 years, what do you do?

[Speaker 2]
Start another one.

[Speaker 1]
Start a new one. Okay. Okay.

We did this one already. We'll go to the second verse. Swallow your cookie in the next five seconds.

This has got to speed up. Brian's not going to make it. Okay.

One, two, three. Swallow your cookie in the next five seconds. This has got to speed up.

One, two, three. Swallow your cookie in the next five seconds. Let's go find that piece that we did.

By the way, this is why I don't convert it from Roman until I'm done with the whole book. Because then I can search for stuff. Although you could convert it and leave the Roman and put the Tibetan under it.

You know what I mean? But it's like, Aura's law at midnight, the night before the class, she gets the final Roman version. And then theoretically somebody should archive that.

And that should be a translation thing. Okay, Alistair's law? Somebody has to archive your final Roman version.

Roman and English, or whatever language you're doing. That has to be archived. Because what happens is that systems for representing Tibetan on computers change constantly.

Like the one we used before three-year retreat is no longer usable. And so we have all these documents from before three-year retreat that have Tibetan script in them that we can't use anymore. Unless you get WordPerfect or someone to compare it.

No, you can write a program, but you don't always have a free programmer around. So anyway, make a final ASCII version. ASCII meaning straight computer language text.

And then have it around as the base copy that's going to be around for the next few hundred years. And then convert it into whatever is popular, or whatever script is popular. Once Unicode is out, it might be okay.

Because that will replace, in a way it will be just a bigger ASCII. So anyway, we have translated these lines. Fix this as per commentary later.

Okay. We're going to still do it later. At the very beginning then I sing the praises of compassion for love.

And only love was said to be like the seed for the excellent crops of the victors. Like the water that makes them grow. Like the years of ripening it takes for them to become a thing we can pretend.

Okay. So as you see we're like piecing together the root text. We're translating the root text.

We're like... We're getting it all in one place. Because it spreads throughout what we've been working on.

Where? For them to become the things we want them to be. Yeah.

Okay. Okay. You ready?

One, two, three. Dhammo rashe dakla shen durshin. Dakhi dheeshe mrla chakye pa.

So chen chenta rama me pa yi. Drola nije yor kam de la du. Okay.

By the way, up here you see that the file is called jupa, root text. In the monastery of Madhyamaka Avatara it's just called Avatara. In Tibetan?

Jupa. I said, what are you working on nowadays? Jupa.

Or are you working on gen? What's gen? Mundo gen.

Okay. Like that. They don't say the whole name of the book.

They just say... Like if you're working on a Midsummer Night's Dream. They'll say dream.

I'm on dream. You see what I mean? Because everybody knows you're on one of them.

Okay. How many chants I did that? Yeah.

These are very beautiful. I bow down to the state of... Let's do it together.

You ready? One, two, in English, three. I bow down to the state of mind that feels compassion for living beings.

For those who begin by thinking me, in turns by the idea of self, and then they find themselves attached to beings, to the mind, and continue to live like a water beetle, helplessly turning on and on. So this is like that Beatles song, what? I'll be mine.

Why would I be mine? All through the night, I'll be mine, I'll be mine, I'll be mine. It's a beautiful song.

So it's me and mine, me and mine. Dak and daki. And there were some questions about the text.

Is it sheng yur sheng or is it daki? Let's just look at the tengyur. Okay?

Let's see what the tengyur says. It's good to put another piece of it. She dak la shin.

And those of you who are new, we're learning to use the database. So in the last... ACIP is going to be 20 years old next year.

We should have a party or something, right? They've input, I don't know, about 300,000 pages or some more. And so, for the first time in history, you can check things and make sure they're correct and like that.

Within a few seconds. Within five to ten seconds. It used to take us about three days to do the search for about the three to five seconds.

We'd have to go to the temple, unwrap the proper volume of the tengyur or kongyur out of 210 volumes, pick the right one, unwrap the outer cloth, unwrap the inner cloth, untie the two sets of straps. And then, at a glance, scan through the book, page by page. And if you just blink, you have to start over again.

A thousand pages. Now it's a few seconds. Then you had to re-wrap them perfectly or Rinpoche would know that you had gotten into the books.

Which in a proper temple should never be open. They should just be up there, nice straight silk cloths. So, you have a choice.

Kongyur, tengyur, or sumpong. Where are we going to look for a commentary? In the tengyur.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah.

[Speaker 1]
We can make the search faster if we know which section of the tengyur. Uma. Okay, the Manimika section.

And here you see jupa, right? Right here. That was back in the days when you only had eight letters for a folder name.

So we had to come up with creative things. And these corrections are just added later by me, I think. And I don't think they're correct anymore.

So, I think they're okay. And there's rules about whether shing should come after an R or ching should come after an R. Let's chat.

Okay? What I'd like to do is... You can open another...

Well, we'll use the same window. You do... This is cool.

You just say R, shing. Or R, ching. And this...

One vote for ching. One vote for ching. One vote for shing.

Let's do it again. It's the same suffix letter. So what follows it should be consistent.

Got it? Like whether you use ching or shing or shing is determined by the last letter of the last word. So let's see.

This says gyur, ching. This says gyur, ching. And this says gyur, shing.

Okay, the rule after R is that it should be sha. It should say gyur, shing. So are there immediately two cases in the tengyur where it's misspelled?

Look more carefully. Is this ngyur? What is it?

Say gyur. It's different from ngyur. Say ngyur.

There's a little n sound before it. Ngyur. Let's say gyur.

Ngyur is the present and future tense. Gyur is the past tense. And it's a big difference, okay?

If you're gonna say, I'm gonna see you tomorrow, you might use ngyur. If you're gonna say, I saw him yesterday, you say gyur. If you can't separate them, then people don't know whether you're coming tomorrow or yesterday.

Okay? So you have to learn the difference. Gyur and gyur.

I imagine the Chinese terms are the same, but I'm just ignoring them right now. Okay? Which means instead of two words, you're like, it could be 30 different words.

Okay, but... In ancient Tibetan, how many secondary suffixes are there in Tibetan? Yeah, sa and da.

But the da is gone. The da dropped out of the language. Okay?

So for example, if you wanna say rigpa, it could mean, without the sa, silent suffix letter, it could mean, without the sa, it means... Knowledge. Knowledge.

And with the sa, it means... Logical. Logical family.

And it's silent, except in Ladakh. Or places that probably speak the way it was spoken before it changed. So, they're saying rigspa.

Or in Mongolia, they still say rigspa. Okay? But there was a second suffix letter, second suffix letter, named da.

And it was used for past tense. Like something in English, what?

[Speaker 2]
ED.

[Speaker 1]
So it's easy to remember. In English, we use ED a lot of times. In Tibetan, they used da.

It disappeared from the written language. But its effects still linger. Because after a da, you should put jing instead of shing.

Okay? So here you've got a short jing, and it's correct. It's cool.

It means in ancient times, there was a D after the jir. And if you know about this thing, then you can translate really bad manuscripts live. Not all of this is biochemical.

No, you can reconstruct stuff. And some old manuscripts, you still see the da. So you can do a better job of translating very difficult handwritten manuscripts, if you know this rule.

So this is for the more advanced people. If you see jing after jir, it's not necessarily wrong. It might be a sign that it was past tense.

So let's check the one we have. Is it past tense? Jir or shing?

Which should it be? It should be jing. Okay?

Unless the jir is misspelled. Okay. Which is possible.

And then daki... This is okay. The old one looks good.

All right? So are you entranced by the idea of a self if you think I'm me? Are you entranced by the idea of a self if you think you are yourself?

Are you yourself? Of course you're yourself. You're not me, because you didn't get to drink the chocolate drink.

That proves it. So is there a self then? Is it wrong to be entranced by a self?

[Speaker 2]
You might be wrong to be entranced by it. You're entranced by a self-appearing self. It seems like entranced, that's like you're not using your full clarity of mind.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah, good. She said, when you're entranced, you're not using your mind clearly. And that's the implication of the word shenpa in Tibetan.

You had it in the Lojong text, shenpa shida. What's that mean? Shenpa shida.

Remember back in Lojong? Yeah. Freedom from the four attachments.

So attachment has that same sort of implication, okay? Shenpa. Say, yu gi dak, me gi dak, yu gi dak, me gi dak.

It's y-o-d-r-g-y-u-'-i-b-d-a-g. I'll say it again. y-o-d-r-g-y-u-'-i-b-d-a-g.

And then you replace the y-o-d with m-e-d. Okay? I want to teach you jor-long.

Say jor-long. And I'll type it. Let's type it.

And I'll teach you a little jor-long. And then it'll be about time to do bok choy mo. And get the real, original lines.

Okay. Say, yu gi dak, me gi dak, yu gi dak, me gi dak. Now I'm going to do jor-long.

Jor-long means spelling out loud in Tibetan. You shouldn't get in the bad habit of saying y-o-d. And it's an art, and it was important in ancient times, and it's good for learning to spell.

Okay? Say, ya, naro, yo, ta, yu. So you don't anticipate what it's going to change into.

You just say incrementally what you got so far. That's the principle of jor-long. We'll do it again.

Ya. Ya. Naro.

Naro. Yu.

[Speaker 2]
Yu.

[Speaker 1]
Good. I should have said yo. Okay, got it?

You don't anticipate what it's going to become. You just say what it is so far. We'll do it again.

And so I don't want to hear people saying, why all d-r-g, okay, anymore. That's quite a lot. No, I mean, you go to Chengdu and try that.

You won't... you won't get a mark on tongue, you'll get butter. Okay, here we go.

Ya, naro, yo. So the vowels are called by their name. The vowels have names.

The letters are just what they sound like, which is convenient, because that's not the case in... English. It should have been a-ba-ga-da-a-fa-ga.

And they have names. It's weird. A.

And then B? Why? And C.

And then D. And then E. And then F?

Why not Phi? You see what I mean? It's just corrupt.

It's just... It's English. Okay.

We'll start again. Ya. Ya.

Naro. Naro. Yo.

Yo. Da. Da.

Yo. Yo. Okay.

Ra. Ra. Ga-tak.

Ga-tak. Tak means stuck on. So you say ra, then you say what gets stuck on, and then you say tak.

You should say ra-tak-ga, right? But it doesn't work that way. Okay, we'll do it again.

Ra.

[Speaker 2]
Ra.

[Speaker 1]
Ga-tak.

[Speaker 2]
Ga-tak.

[Speaker 1]
And then what do you have so far? Ga. Ga.

Listen carefully. Ra.

[Speaker 2]
Ra.

[Speaker 1]
Ka-tak. Ka-tak. Ga.

Ga. So the G has already changed by the second G. It's changed from ga to ga.

Because when a ga gets a head letter, ra, it changes to ga. But you don't anticipate. You don't say ra, ga-tak-ga.

You say ra. Ra. Ka-tak.

Ka-tak. Ga. Ga.

Okay, it's very good for learning how the words change with head letters. So ra, ka-tak, ga. Ya-tak.

[Speaker 2]
Ya-tak.

[Speaker 1]
Stick a Y on that, and you've got gya. Gya. Sha-gyu.

Sha-gyu. Which means foot hook, right? Gyu.

Gyu. A. A.

Gigu. Gigu. I.

I. Gyu. Gyu.

Okay? All right, guys? Who thinks that sounds easier?

When you're going to alert your listener that you're saying a prefix letter, you add the suffix O to it. So listen. Pow.

Pow. Pow. That means I'm giving you a B, but it's only a prefix letter.

Pow. Pow. And now you've changed the da already.

Da. Da. It's not da anymore.

It's pow. Pow. Da.

Da. Ka. Ka.

Tak. Tak. Okay?

Pow. Pow. Da.

Da. Sorry. Pow.

Pow. Da. Da.

Ka. Ka. Da.

Da. So we'll do the whole thing. Ready?

One, two, three, start. Ya. Na.

Ro. Yo. Da.

Gyu. Ra. Ga.

Tak. Ga. Ya.

Tak. Gya. Sha.

Gyu. Gyu. A.

Gyu. I. Gyu.

And then you pause, to let the guy digest. Then you say, Pow. Da.

Ka. Da. And then just to be sure, he said, Yugi Da.

Yugi Da.

[Speaker 2]
Yugi Da. Yugi Da.

[Speaker 1]
And let's do the next one. Ma. Genbu.

Genbu means, by the way, to raise a flagpole. And you know that famous picture of Iwo Jima when the flag's half up? So the flag, it means the flagpole.

People are lifting up a pole and it's halfway up and it's that vowel that goes like that. Okay? Genbu.

So, we'll start over. Ma. Genbu.

Me.

[Speaker 2]
Da. Me.

[Speaker 1]
Ra. Ga. Tak.

Ga. Sorry. Ya.

Tak. Gya. Sha.

Gyu. Gyu. A.

Gyu. Ku. I.

Gyu. Pao. Da.

Ka. Da. Me.

Gyu. Da.

[Speaker 2]
Me.

[Speaker 1]
Gyu. Da.

[Speaker 2]
Me. Gyu. Da.

[Speaker 1]
This is a very, very important principle. And if you learn this in this class tonight, you can impress your friends for your whole life. Okay?

Yugi Da means the self which does exist. This is a very rare usage of the word gyu. Gyu means here, which does.

Usually it means, what's gyu usually mean? Cause. Okay?

It's like in English we say, there ain't no cause to get upset. Or like that, or because. So it just got, it just came to be which is.

So Yugi Da means the self which does exist. And Me Gyu Da means the self which doesn't exist. Here's the Yugi Da.

Okay? No, and if you didn't get any, what? Talk to Anatole and Adriana.

Or be nicer to Geshe Michael. Which one? Yeah, neither one.

Share it with other people. Okay? If you don't share it, and you try to keep it for yourself, then that becomes Me Gyu Da.

Then that chocolate drink is a Me Gyu Da. Means what? That's the chocolate drink that doesn't exist.

There's no chocolate drink in this room. I opened up the refrigerator this morning. You know, and I was like, do we have enough fruit to make the morning fruit juice?

This is, Anatole started this. I don't know, he put this seed in my head like three years ago. Now it's like, came out.

Gotta have morning fresh fruit juice. So you know, I'm like looking in the refrigerator. Did the kids eat all the grapes?

Or not? You know? And then I caught myself.

You know, it's like, I hope they ate all the grapes. Because then I'll have fruit. Right?

Okay? That's... You see, the grapes that I didn't want them...

The grapes that I wanted to be there were Me Gyu Da. Those are grapes that don't exist. They are grapes which you can keep if you protect your grapes.

If you hide them... with almonds behind the cereal box, over the fan, above the stove. Okay?

Alright? Like, those are Me Gyu Da. The ones you can protect by not sharing them.

Those almonds, those grapes, they don't exist. Those are Me Gyu Da. Okay?

And then, you Gyu Da is... is the fruit that I found tucked in the bottom freezer drawer, the cooler drawer thing at the bottom. In the back, after I had the thought, I hope they ate the grapes.

You see what I mean? They were created by Me having the thought, I hope other people share our fruit. Because then I'll get fruit the whole term.

You see what I mean? That fruit that's gone, is You Gyu Da. That fruit which was already shared is grapes that aren't grapes.

And the grapes I didn't want to share are grapes that aren't grapes. Got it? So now the question, why did I bring this up?

Because I had to kill five minutes. No. Why did I bring this up?

Because when your friends read those early Buddhist translations, which are still being put out, and it says, entranced by the idea of a self, and then they're going to ask you, well, do you believe that in a self or not? Do you think the grapes are themselves? Do you think you are your self?

And it is the refrigerator itself. I heard Buddhists don't believe in a self. I heard this Atman thing, Atman.

And all the Hindus are screwed up because they believe in Atman. And all the Buddhists are cool because they believe in Anatman, which means there's no self. But who are you?

And then you're going to say, look, there's yu gi dak and me yu dak. Ya, naro, yo. No, it's very impressive.

And then like half an hour later you say, now there's yu gi dak. It exists. And the me yu dak, it doesn't exist.

So you can't... When you ask me whether Buddhists believe in a self, whether things are themselves or not, I'd have to ask you first, do you mean the grapes I didn't want to share, or do you mean the grapes I did share? Well, what about the grapes you didn't want to share?

They don't exist. What about the grapes you do want to share? They don't exist either because the kids ate them yesterday.

No, not like that. They exist. They exist.

Because they work. When I share them, I get more grapes. So they do have a self nature.

I can create karma from them. I can get on a roll that ends in Buddhahood with them, with those grapes. Grapes that I share exist.

Grapes that I don't want to share don't exist. And then it's things that don't exist that you can... that you get angry about, or you get jealous about, or you get possessive about, and that's why me and mine come up here.

It's the grapes that don't exist that you want to be mine. And then somebody invades your grapes. Like, they took my grapes.

I knew R and Jamie would end up doing that. We should have put a label on them that said, Christine Michaels grapes. Like that.

Then you get into problems. Then you get mental afflictions. Then you get unhappy.

Then you want more grapes. Then you protect them. Then in the end you don't have grapes.

They go bad. In the bag. Overnight.

Why do you buy a new box of strawberries and they're all green the next morning? It's because you didn't share the grapes. You see?

Okay? Got it? I'm just telling you how to get the chocolate drink.

Say, you get that? They get that. So that question from many, many, many of your students in the future.

Many, many people you will meet in the future. Do Buddhists believe in the Self or not? And how do they differ from Hindus?

They don't differ. Really, they don't differ. Every Hindu in the world believes that things come from karma.

Every Buddhist in the world thinks that things come from karma. And I had this discussion with this ancient Hindu sage named Jambudvipa on top of the holy Jain mountain, you know. And, what's it called there now?

Palitana. Yeah. And at the end he's like, oh, you're just like us.

You know? Like for 90 years. His mom was there.

She's 120. And for 90 years he thought Buddhists didn't believe in karma because they don't believe in atma. And he didn't understand.

And it was so cool to to explain it correctly. So now you're going to explain the Self correctly. Right?

Ya. Say ya. Ya.

Nara. Nara. Ya.

Da. Da. Ra.

Ra. Gatak. Gatak.

Ga. Ga. Yatak.

Yatak. Ya. Ya.

Shabkyu. Shabkyu. Gyu.

Gyu. Aa. Aa.

Gyukyu. Gyukyu. Ee.

Ee. Gyuyu. Gyuyu.

Pao. Pao. Da.

Da. Da. Da.

Ok. See you later. Who's going to...

Uh... Yaso?

[Speaker 2]
So she... Yes. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Thank you.