I just want to say that when we study, have this kind of study, it's very idealistic and it's pointed toward the most ideal practice. it might seem unreachable. How does this apply to me? How can I do this? So one of the problems that we have is facing some kind of idealistic understanding which is true So we have to realize that the practice that you have is just right.

[01:04]

And the place where you are is just right. Like I said this morning, we absorb this material and it works within us and is a catalyst for bringing out our practice. A catalyst for bringing forth our practice and wisdom without trying too hard to do something. If you catch the tail of a comet, people will pity you. Although this applies to us, definitely, We shouldn't let it compare with our own practice as this is the ideal and look at me.

[02:34]

So I think we need to be careful about that. And it's also important to realize that a lot of what is said here is already what you do. It's already what we do. But it's capped in a certain language. The sixth ancestor, Guinan, one of his accomplishments was to take this very highly specialized view and language and present it in an ordinary way. That's what's so nice about the Platform Sutra. So I'll present a little bit about, read a little from the Patrim Sutra. First, I'd like to present something from Dogen Zenji. How Dogen deals with Dharma, Dharmas.

[03:39]

And in Ginjo Koan, Many of us are familiar with Dogen's Genjo-Koan. I think some of us are not. But Genjo-Koan is Dogen's touchstone for all the rest of the fascicles of the Genjo-Koan. And the opening statement of Genjo-Koan is, when all Dharmas are Buddhadharma, When all dharmas are buddhadharma, there are enlightenment and delusion, practice, life and death, buddhas and creatures. When the ten thousand dharmas are without self, there are no delusion, no enlightenment, no buddhas, no creatures, no life, no death. So Dogen is presenting his understanding of dharma and dharmas in these two different ways. One is, when all dharmas are buddhadharma, there it is.

[04:50]

And when the ten thousand dharmas are without self, there is not. So he presented is and is not as a balance of non-duality. I'm not going to read this whole thing because I don't think it's what we're studying here. But I just want to present some of Dogen's understanding and the way he talks about dharmas. He says, to carry the self forward and realize the 10,000 dharmas is delusion. That the 10,000 dharmas advance and realize the self is enlightenment. It is buddhas who enlighten delusion and it is creatures who are deluded in enlightenment. Then, the central statement of Genjo Koan is to study the Buddha way is to study the self.

[05:59]

To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by the 10,000 dharmas. To be enlightened by the 10,000 dharmas is to free one's body and mind and those of others. And this traceless enlightenment is continued forever. If one examines the 10,000 dharmas with a deluded body and mind, one might suppose that one's mind and nature are permanent. But if one practices intimately and returns to the true self, it will be clear that the 10,000 dharmas are without a self. Then he says, now if a fish or a bird, bird or fish, tries to reach the limit of its element before moving in it, this bird or this fish will not find its way or its place.

[07:03]

Attaining this place, one's daily life, is the realization of ultimate reality. Attaining this way, one's daily life, is the realization of ultimate reality. Since this place and this way are neither large nor small, neither self nor other, neither existing previously nor just arising now, they therefore exist thus. Thus, if one practices and realizes the Buddha way, when one gains one dharma, one penetrates one dharma. When one encounters one action, one practices one action. So these are dummies only dealing with this same problem. And anyway, no way. So what? What book is that? Wonderful photographs.

[08:05]

This is a title photograph. Yes, he just died two months ago. He was the abbot of Maezumi Roshi's... But the book is Maezumi Roshi, right? It's both of them. It's Maezumi Roshi's commentary on Dojo Kōan and Daido's photographs. He put this book together back in the 70s. And of course it's out of print, but every once in a while I find one. What's the title again? The Way of Everyday Life. Ken Jokowan is The Way of Everyday Life. That's all I was talking about. It sounds maybe highfalutin, but it's The Way of Everyday Life. How we understand our life. So, I would like to study Ginger Cohen again.

[09:13]

We did that some years ago, several times. The cycle of talks takes a long time to come around again. So, I said that I wanted to talk about Consciousness is wisdom. So I'm going to ask about wisdom. Where does wisdom come from? Which is a good question. Where does wisdom come from? It doesn't come from anywhere. Wisdom comes when There's nothing blocking it. Wisdom is our innate nature. It doesn't come from someplace. It's not like a thing that comes from somewhere that you can get. It's simply your intrinsic nature when it's unveiled.

[10:14]

So that's why we say to not gain anything. Practice is the non-gaining activity. If you try to gain something, you're reaching outside of yourself. And when you reach outside of yourself, you're going away from yourself. So whatever it is that you reach for, is inside, so to speak. Even though there's no inside or outside. But provisionally speaking, inside is where it is. It's where your trigger just is. That's why the Sintra is talking about letting go and understanding what is real and what is not real. When you understand what is real and what is not real then you have a choice of letting go of what is not real so that what is real can emerge.

[11:16]

So in the eight levels of consciousness, even though there are nine, we talk about eight, because you can't really talk about nine. Because nine has no special characteristics. Nine is like the accomplished thing. As I was saying, Bhairavachana, dharmakaya. So dharmakaya is not something that we can describe. But it's the basis for all the dharmas. So stillness is the basis for movement. Emptiness is the basis for form. Nothing is the basis for something. Although emptiness is not nothing.

[12:25]

It's no special thing. It has no special shape or form. But it's expressed as the various forms. So if we want to understand or if we want to see emptiness We have to look at a form. Because all forms are emptiness. But if you try to see something called an emptiness, even if you look at the sky, that's just a metaphor for emptiness. So empty means that nothing has its own inherent nature. Empty of inherent nature. emptiness, but it pervades everything. So, when we realize the emptiness of all forms, then wisdom arises spontaneously.

[13:36]

It's called prajna. There's a word prana, which means information, or it means knowledge. Sometimes the word pragma is used to mean knowledge, but basically it means wisdom. So wisdom means the same things as it is, in an undistorted way. There's something called Parivrtti. Parivrtti means turning or transformation. It's like a door. Maybe a secret door. A door that turns like this, like on a stage, a stage set.

[14:37]

And the door here is Consciousness. Eight Consciousnesses. And then when it's turned, it's called four Wisdoms. Four aspects of Wisdom. And it's not that it turns into Wisdom. It's that it's not a change in substance. It's simply a change in wording. So that which is the transformation is that which is impinging wisdom becomes wisdom. So that's why we say sometimes big ego is big Buddha. So we don't say big ego is bad, necessarily, although it is simply ignorant.

[15:51]

It can be bad, but it's basically ignorant. And when we acknowledge all the dharmas that are coming up in us, anger, love, whatever the dharmas are, good dharmas or bad dharmas, or indifferent dharmas, we should see them come up without judgment. To just see them as they are. And when we see them as they are, concentration or with mindfulness, then we can actually examine who we are. We can examine the feelings and the feelings, examine the thoughts, the consciousness and so forth.

[16:59]

In this way, when we examine them, we have the ability to have some space from them. So people sometimes say, how can I control my anger? And there's nothing you can say that will help them. You can't just stop being angry as a mode. Most people can't just stop being angry. You have to practice not being angry. So practice is really necessary for any kind of transformations. When you practice over and over again with your emotions and feelings, then you have some way to deal with them. So, as Sutra says, mind control.

[18:09]

Meaning, not controlling exactly, but with awareness, giving yourself some space. If we try to control ourself without understanding, trying to understand, then it's just suppression. and suppression will burst out. So understanding is really necessary when this anger comes up. But what is this anger? Without saying I don't like it or it's bad or whatever. But just to examine what it is. Perhaps you could say not being controlled by rather than Yes, this is the way of helping yourself to not be controlled by. That's right. So it's not being controlled by, rather than trying to control.

[19:15]

I think that works good well. Sometimes we just have to swallow things. I want to talk about, as I said, the wisdom, how wisdom arises from introverty. So someone asked a Sixth Patriarch. I'm using this as a kind of vehicle. Someone asked the Sixth Patriarch, He said, Bhikkhu Jitthong, a native of Xiaojiao of Anfeng, had read the Vankavatara Sutra nearly a thousand times, but he could not understand the meaning of trakaya and the four pranayamas. Thereupon he called on the answer of the patriarch for an interpretation.

[20:17]

The Lama Kapturya Sutra was supposed to be something that Bodhidharma brought to China from India. And it's a kind of puzzle sutra in many ways. It doesn't have a lot of continuity, but it talks about mind consciousness. And it's considered one of the sutras that is authoritative on elements of mind, as we've been studying. And the four prajnas are the four wisdoms. But he says the meaning of the trakaya in the four prajnas. So I want you to bear with me, numerically, There are eight levels of consciousness, right? There are four wisdoms, and there are three bodies.

[21:21]

The three bodies you're familiar with, because I talk about them a lot. The dharmakaya, the dharma body, the sambhogakaya, and you eat them every time you eat a meal. And the nirmanakaya, kaya means body. So, dharma body, sambhoga body, and nirmana body. Dharmakaya is the reality or truth body, which has no special shape or form. That's vairocana. Vairocana dharmakaya buddha. He said it twice today. And then we say, Sambhogakaya Locana Buddha. Locana means Amida Buddha. Actually, Locana is the name for Amida.

[22:25]

And then Nirmanakaya Shakyamuni. So, Sambhogakaya, the Sixth Ancestor says, Sambhogakaya is our wisdom body. Dharmakaya is our pure body. Nirmanakaya is our wisdom body. Nirmanakaya is our activity body, transformation body. Transformation means in this world everything is transforming. So this is the transformation body. So those are the three bodies of Buddha, but they're your three bodies. They're not some Buddha's bodies, they're your Buddha's bodies. So each one of us has these three bodies, is made of these three bodies, generally. We have the Dharmakaya that is our true nature, which is what we're always trying to discover.

[23:29]

Sambhogakaya is our wisdom. When we talk about Buddha, basically we're talking about Sambhogakaya. Because Sambhogakaya is like the Buddha who wrote the sutras. But who wrote the sutras? Shakyamuni didn't write the sutras. There were no written down sutras until 400 years after Shakyamuni died. So this is the wisdom that's the Buddha wisdom within us. We don't know who wrote the sutras, but there's some thread of something that Shakyamuni presented that was the germ for the sutras. And then nirmanakaya is Buddha in the world of activity.

[24:34]

So these are the three bodies of Buddha. The trikaya, the three bodies. Tri means three. Kaya means body. So these are our three bodies. We also, when we talk about the three treasures, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, that's you. You are Buddha, you are Dharma, you are Sangha. Each one of us is Buddha, Dharma, Sangha in the same way. And actually, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha is a kind of same thing as the Trikaya, when you think about it. a native of Xiaozhou, of Antang, had read the Bhagavatara Sutra nearly a thousand times. But he could not understand the meaning of the trikaya and the four pranayamas.

[25:44]

Thereupon he called the patriarch for an interpretation. And so the patriarch says, is your wisdom, and the Myriad and Manakaya are your actions. So, you are Shakyamuni Buddha. In the old Neel Sutra chant, the original one that we had in Japanese, which we used to chant, it said, homage to the nirmanakaya Shakyamuni Buddha all over the world. Meaning, in Shakyamuni except 2,500 years and a little more wisdom. So if you deal with these three bodies apart from the essence of mind, there will be bodies without wisdom.

[26:52]

If you realize that these three bodies have no positive essence of their own because they are only the properties of the essence of mind. I don't understand that. Jyotindra Bodhi of the Four Prajnas. If you realize that these three bodies have no positive essence of their own, it's because they are only the properties of the essence of mind. Right? So, they have to be blown up by the essence of mind. a balloon. The essence of mind blows into the balloon and the balloon comes up as you. The breath of life is breathed into you. So these bodies have no positive essence of their own because they are only the properties of the essence of mind. You attain the body of the four paramitas. So listen to my stanza. The three bodies are inherent in your essence of mind, by development of which the four prajnas are manifested.

[28:02]

Thus, without shutting your eyes and your ears to keep away from the external world, you may reach Buddha directly. Now that I have made this plain to you, believe it firmly and you will be free from delusions forever. I wish it was that easy. follow but those who seek enlightenment from without." These people talk about Bodhi all the time, but they never find it, because they're always searching for it someplace. And then he says, may I know something about the Four Prophets, S. T. Dong? If you understand the Three Bodies, replied the patriarch, you should understand the Four Prophets as well. So your question is quite unnecessary. If you deal with the four prajnas apart from the three bodies, it would be prajnas without bodies, in which case they would not be prajna. So you need both. So the patriarch then understands it.

[29:04]

The mirror-like wisdom is pure by nature. So mirror-like wisdom is alaya-vijnana. But alaya-vijnana terms, Parivrtti, it becomes the mirror-like wisdom, which reflects everything as it is. So, this is called the mirror mind. which has no... because the... a laya-vijñāna can do this because a laya-vijñāna is neither pure nor impure and does not make decisions. It really has no mind of its own. There's no ego in a laya-vijñāna. It simply is the consciousness that allows

[30:10]

purely prial dharmas to arise. It's the receptacle. When you started, you talked about this being an idealistic teaching. But just now, if you read that thing, what he said about if there were no bodies, there would be no wisdom to the mind, Can you read it again? OK. What he's saying is that bodies without the wisdom are disembodied. The wisdom without bodies cannot. The wisdom needs a body. Right. So the materialistic part of this is that all of these teachings seems like they're relevant to us because we actually have bodies. And if we didn't have bodies, they wouldn't be of any... they would have... I'm not saying it's not relevant to us at all. No, no, I didn't say you were saying it. I'm just saying, I'm just trying to, the context for the teachings is that we have a body.

[31:18]

Oh yes, absolutely. So the Dharmas, and that's a dubious thing, that without a body, The darkness and the consciousnesses are not two. But the whole point is, of this teaching which we've been doing all day, is that... I didn't get to actually. And I started to talk about that. I said, when we see, the consciousness sees, and what it sees is the object. And in between is the organ. So the organ doesn't see. But the consciousness arises with seeing.

[32:20]

So it's consciousness that sees. than proven. It is consciousness that sees and arises when it sees. So it seems like the consciousness and the object are two different things. The whole point is that what appears to be two different things is not two different things. that the consciousness and the object of consciousness are one. But we divide them. Consciousness is discriminatory. The meaning of consciousness actually is discriminating. The alaya doesn't discriminate. But the seven consciousnesses is the great discriminating consciousness which divides subject from object. So when you read the literature, it's always saying, no subject in object.

[33:22]

That doesn't say much about it, right? No subject doesn't mean that there's no subject in object. There is. The object, the Third Ancestor says in the Xin Xin Ming, the subject is the subject for the object. The object is an object for the subject. If you remember that. If you've ever taught it, right? Somebody did here. Subject is a subject for the object. The object is an object for the subject. So yes, there is subject and object, but the subject makes the object, and the object makes the subject, because they're one thing. But discrimination divides them. So it's really hard to see that, because our minds are continually discriminating. They interact. They do not interact, otherwise they remain in their own states. So what's it with our own states then? Well, every dharma is in its own dharma position.

[34:30]

Every dharma is in its own dharma position and independent of before and after. independent of history and independent of future. Every Dharma exists in its own Dharma position as it is. That's what he said. What does that mean? Well, it means that everything is momentary. Every dharma is momentary and gives way to the next dharma. And the series, what we see as continuity, is simply a series of dharmas giving way to dharmas of the same type. In other words, when we think of thought, when we are acting and so forth, of movement, and we think in terms of large movements.

[35:39]

We don't think in terms of incremental movements. So we think in terms of, I'm going to do this, and I do it. Big sweeping gestures. But if you look closely, it's like a movie. One film, frame after another. So every dharma is momentary. This is called the dharma of momentariness. Every dharma is momentary, but we see it as a moment. So if you slow down enough, But actually you can't slow down that much because there's so many kasana moments in a minute. Maybe a million?

[36:41]

Something like that. I don't know who counted them. Some patient monk. Counting how many momentarinesses there are in a moment. The reason is that each dharma is in its own dharma position momentarily, like a flash. But these flashes are continuous because they keep perpetuating themselves. This is called the perpetuation of dharmas. That's all he was talking about. The perpetuation of dharmas. This is the alive vijnana that a stream, like a torrent, like a rushing torrent creating itself in a series moment after moment and so the sutra here says there is a time when the torrent actually comes to a halt

[37:53]

in a form of arhatship. So when we sit zazen, we can see, I mean we experience this rushing torment, because we're sitting still, and the mind is, the alive is none, you can see the alive is none as all the thought forms that are rushing through your head. You're actually experiencing firsthand the alive Vijnana as it's continually rushing through your mind. It is your mind. So when we sit still, we don't try to stop the alive Vijnana because it's like a rushing torrent. You can't do that. You can, but it'll wash over you eventually anyway. It's like those waves out of that.

[38:56]

And by sitting still, you can see it. When you're not sitting still, you're moving within it, and you can't see it, because there's no contrast. So we need this contrast to be able to see it. But we don't try to do anything with it. This is called stopping Actually, it's sitting still, you know, and letting the mind rush and being mindful of that from time to time without it affecting us. So you become independent of a life as Nana, actually. without discriminating. So, consciousness, discriminating consciousness, if you really are sitting still, without averting feelings, and without grasping them, and without trying to stop the flow, and just letting everything come as it comes, let everything go as it goes, you are empty.

[40:18]

And you can conform to whatever is happening. We ain't conforming, right? But inside then, you have to conform. You have to take the shape of whatever is happening. If you resist the shape of what's happening and try to form some other shape, that's called suffering. That's why when we sit Satsang, we have to let go so that we become flexible. I always talk about flexibility of both mind and body. That's what you have to be able to do. Suzuki Roshi talks about soft mind, which doesn't mean stupidity. It means like grass. When the wind blows, the grass lies down. The grass conforms to the wind. gets torn out.

[41:21]

But when the wind goes by, the grass comes back up. And it's not a problem. And this is what Master Hua was talking about when he talked about emptiness. When you punch the body that was empty, then So, and this is how we can meet with everyone. Because we don't have anything special that's breakable. And we can conform to whoever we meet. Avalokitesvara's practice is to conform to every person, to every situation.

[42:26]

in various guises. When you meet a man, you conform to the man. When you meet a woman, you conform to the woman. Whatever situation, you know what your place is in the situation without getting caught by the situation. And it's not like you plan anything, it's just when there's nothing there, you know what to do. So, the Patriarch then uttered another stanza. He said, Mere life-wisdom is pure by nature. So this is the purity of a life as jnana. This all depends on manas, because manas is the defiled consciousness.

[43:36]

And the other consciousnesses become tainted through manas, which is what we call our ego, our false sense of self. When manas, it turns on its base, is purified, meaning it no longer is deluded, thinking that alaya-vijnana is its true self. Alaya-vijnana is not the true self of manas. thoughts, feelings and so forth. So when Manas turns, it becomes the wisdom of equality. You see the sameness throughout all of the diversity.

[44:39]

You see the thread that runs through all the diversity. The sameness that runs through all the diversity. which is horizontal. Everything is level because you're seeing the emptiness of all phenomena. So that's why Rosa Parks didn't conform? Well, that's a different situation. She conformed to something else. That's right. She didn't conform to That would be the equality. She conformed to the equality. Yes, she conformed to the equality. So sometimes when you meet something you're not always conforming to that thing. Well, conforming means taking the proper shape. It's wisdom appearing. It doesn't mean that you conform to everything that appears.

[45:43]

No, it doesn't mean that you do what somebody else does. It means that you take the shape which... If there's violence, for example, you try to prevent it. Depending on what kind of violence. Right. So you take the shape of the violence but you don't participate in the violence. When you, in aikido, you meet the opponent, but you meet the opponent on your own terms. And you use the opponent's off-balance, or you use the opponent's own body weight to throw them off-balance. So that's conforming to the situation, because you're not fighting the person. You're simply using the person's own aggression to defeat them. If you want to call it defeating.

[46:44]

It's not called defeating. Simply setting things straight. So, when Manas turns, then it becomes the equality. But that's... the wisdom of equality is to see the Buddha nature in everything. It doesn't mean that hierarchy is eliminated. Because when the wisdom of the sixth Is that a word?

[47:52]

Consciousness. When you see consciousness in terms, it becomes the wisdom of differentiation. You see into... in other words, that's the vertical. So vertical... means that everything has its own place which is different than every other place. So the wisdom of equality is sameness and the wisdom of differentiation is difference. Recognizing the qualities of each individual thing. So it's not like life is flat. Life is dynamic as well as flat. So this is the balance, the balance between leveling and dynamism.

[49:03]

You realize the dynamic quality of each individual thing and appreciating and seeing the truth of each separate existence because you realize the emptiness of all dharmas you realize the emptiness of all dharmas and everything is the same and you realize the emptiness of all dharmas and realize that each dharma is different so difference and sameness are balanced And right where those two meet is where life takes place. And then he says, this is called the equality wisdom, and the all-discerning wisdom that sees things intuitively without going through the process of reasoning.

[50:10]

I like that. I never saw that before. I realized that he said that in that way, but that's intuitive. But usually it's not worded that way, but I like that. The old asserting wisdom, which sees things intuitively without going through the process of reasoning, that's intuition. and the hierarchy. Hierarchy is an interesting word because we usually think of hierarchy as power. The people at the top of the hierarchy are the people that have the power, which is true. But if you don't associate hierarchy with power, you can see, as I was talking about this morning, that every part of the plant has a purpose. And when all the elements of the plant, or all the elements of the gentian, or whatever you want to call it, are totally in place, then the whole flower is working well.

[51:21]

When the flower doesn't say, I'm better than the roots. The leaves don't say, I'm better than the flower or the stem. all of the parts of the flower are equal. That's this. They're all equal because without them the plant doesn't work. But yet they're all different. And they're in a hierarchy. So the plant works. Because none of the parts are jealous of each other. They're all doing their function. And the plant thrives. because they're all equal. It's just like the house. The beam, the foundation. You can point to any place on the house and you say, there's the house. So then there's the all-discerning wisdom. No, I'm sorry. The all-performing wisdom, which is the sense consciousnesses.

[52:24]

Five senses. We call it the all-discerning wisdom. when wisdom arises. It says the Aquaphobian wisdom has the same characteristics as the mirror-like wisdom. The reason why, it says, When Buddhahood is attained, the first five vijnanas, the senses, will be transmuted to the all-performing wisdom and the allied vijnana to the mirror-like wisdom. The all-performing wisdom is

[53:33]

how to actually act in the world. So when the consciousnesses are transformed They're called wisdom. It doesn't mean that wisdom is not there. It doesn't mean that vijnana is not there. Just that they're called wisdom. Because wisdom is what is expressed. And the first five are the wisdom of activity. So the mirror wisdom, the horizontal wisdom, the vertical wisdom, and the activity. So when all of the consciousnesses are turned into wisdom, then you act out that in the world through your body and senses.

[54:37]

That's our sensory world. So the whole thing is a wonderful system. It also applies to five ranks. But I'll save that for later. So there are actually four systems that are kind of combined to express this wisdom. It's a really interesting way of expressing things. also used this, I believe he used this to express his five ranks. So then, the big chart says, the first five are visionaries, which are consciousness dependent, we studied them in the five sense organs, right?

[55:40]

That's the fifth one. The first five. And the arrival of vijnana, the storage of universal consciousness, and transmuted to prajna in the Buddha stage, whatever that means. I think, I know what that means, but whenever it does, maybe when that happens, it is the Buddha stage. mādhava-vijñāna and mādhava-vijñāna are transmuted in the bodhisattva state. So these so-called transmutations of vijñāna are only changes of appellations and not a change of substance. In other words, they just change the name, but not the substance. When you are able to free yourself entirely from attachment to sense objects, at the time these so-called transmutations take place, you will forever abide in the repeatedly arising Dragon Samadhi, Naga Samadhi.

[56:52]

That's pretty nice. So upon hearing this, Jigme Phun realized suddenly the prajna of existence of mind and submitted the following stanza to the ancestors. Intrinsically, the three bodies are within our essence of mind. They're not somewhere else. When our mind is enlightened, the four prajnas will appear, or the four wisdoms. When bodies and prajnas absolutely identify with each other, we will be able to respond in accordance with their temperaments and disposition to the appeals of all beings, no matter what forms they may assume. That's what I was saying. So this is a base of wisdom which enables one to meet everyone and conform to what's necessary to meet each person.

[57:59]

Some people are hard to meet, but how do we meet each without giving in to anger or resentment or being caught by the person. That's really our practice. How do you... you know, we do get angry. If we listen to the mutterings of our mind, if we really pay attention to the mutterings of our mind, we're always complaining about something. We're always complaining about something. And we complain and take the form of disgust or anger or disappointment or wishes for their demise and stuff like that.

[59:03]

So this goes on all the time, you know. And then, when we act out, what's there? What do we act out with? So, we don't always express, you know, all those thoughts that we have are contained, are thrown into the garbage can of the 11 yana. And the seeds are there. So we keep doing this, you know. I'm showing some ill will towards this person, but then we're past them and it's all gone, right? But again, people shoot each other, road rage, right? So we have road rage going on in our mind a lot, even though we don't act out. So some seed is thrown in there, but it's a seed that's not, if we have

[60:08]

It's a seed that's weak. There are weak seeds and strong seeds. So if you have a strong seed that you can't control, then you will shoot somebody. It happens all the time. More and more. Maybe we just hear about it more. So, he says, we shall be able to respond in accordance with their temperaments and dispositions all beings, no matter what forms they may assume. There are some people that we can't help. We have to realize that there are some people we can't help. I mean, I know that there are some people I can't help. When I first started doing this, I thought, I can meet everybody. I was a taxi driver for six years, and I met everybody.

[61:11]

When you're dying you meet everybody. Everybody. So I thought, well I can meet everybody. But there were people that I realized I couldn't, I really could not help. And in order to help somebody I would have to completely go to hell with them. and spend all my time there and that would be the end of my life. And it doesn't work. So there are people that are just difficult and will use you if you don't, if you're not careful, if you don't understand. And that's what's happening. Little by little, we realize that some people can practice here.

[62:12]

Some people, they should go somewhere else. And there are various ways of dealing with that. But not everyone. Otherwise, we'd have a kind of madhouse. Yes? Well, I'm sorry not to criticize you, but obviously your practice is not advanced as it was. where he says, what I express is the Buddha Dharma. If anyone thinks that I am speaking incorrectly, all you have to do is bring up your reasons, and we will investigate them. I can meet any of your objections. You can come at me with objections, and I can answer them all. That includes all the people in the entire world, no matter what their nationality. And then he says, I am capable of making tongue transplants as well as brain transplants. If their brains are unclear, I can give them a new set. So you always know. Do you agree? I do. I agree. I see why. Thank you for that. Thank you for not being king.

[63:14]

At least I admit it. But what if it's true? Oh, it's true. I'm sure it's true. Is he dead? Yeah. He died. Nobody can tell me what to do for him. So he says, to start by seeking for the Drakaya and the Four Pranayamas. is to take an entirely wrong course. For being inherent in us, they are to be realized and not to be sought. So that's why it's not good to say either one, but it's better to say a realization of enlightenment appeared rather than I got enlightened. So to try to grasp or confine them is to go against their intrinsic nature.

[64:32]

So you can't hold on. And then he says, through you, sir, I am now able to grasp the profundity of their meaning. No, no. This guy here's name I can't remember. Though you, sir, through you I am able to grasp the profanity of the meaning, and henceforth I may discard forever their false and arbitrary names. Note, having grasped the spirit of the doctrine, one may dispense with the names used, since all names are makeshifts only. That's true. So it's a little bit of a talk about the three bodies. He doesn't really talk about the eight aspects, the eight consciousnesses, but he does talk about Vajrayana.

[65:36]

The three buttons. So if you should move your mic down. Oh yes. So you have anything to discuss. Is it all clear? Because I want you to make a fool of yourself by asking a question. Yes? This is how far I got. You mentioned that first sentence. What's the relationship from all of this to the actual, the Abhidharma? Oh, the Abhidharma, yes. Okay. Abhidhamma is a way of studying the dharmas.

[66:54]

In other words, I think the purpose of Abhidhamma was, by the so-called Hinayana, the various schools, to see into the nature of dharmas. for the purpose of realizing that the dharmas have no self, that there is no purgala, there is no real self. One of the problems with Abhidhamma, the Abhidhammas, they realized the emptiness of a self, that there was no true self, what we call the selfless, just a collection of dharmas. So they thought the self was unreal, but they mostly thought that the dharmas were real. So then somebody like Vasubandhu comes along and says, although, and Nagarjuna as well, that it's not just the self that's not real, not substantial, but the dharmas also.

[68:08]

I'm surprised they didn't know that. Maybe they did, but that was their position. The position was... So, the... It's called ens and non-ens. Ens means is. Non-ens means isn't. So, the Sevastavadins, for instance, felt that dharma was a real. And... So that was the kind of... he didn't go far enough. Right? Yeah. So that's the difference. And so what Vasubandhu was trying to say is that both dharma and self are the same. And was there like a period of time between them or how long was there between them? Well this is an interesting point because You know, people say, I mean, in the old days, they used to say, well, the Pali sutras came first, the Abhidhamma, and that the Mahayana is later.

[69:15]

I think that probably the flowering of the Mahayana was later. But modern scholars believe that they both were incepted at the same time. But the Mahayana took longer. And so in the monasteries, the monasteries weren't just one school necessarily. Various schools developed within a monastery. And so the germs of the Mahayana took this course. And the germs of the seeds of the Hinayana took this course. and they developed in different ways, but the Mahayanas insist that when the Buddha spoke, people understood him in different ways. So he'd say one thing, and these people understood it this way, and these people understood it that way. And so, and I can understand that, when I say something.

[70:24]

Some people understand it this way, and some people understand it that way. And some people misunderstand it. So these people have spent years and years and years dealing with these questions. Kind of a silly question. Right up, you talked, what are little boys made of? Cinnamon snails and puppy dog snails. That's what little boys are made of. What are little girls made of? Sugar and spice and everything nice. How did that pop into your head just thinking about this? Well, because it's true. So then you say, after all this talk, really? I came back to the conclusion that girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice, and boys are made of Sticks and snails and puppy dog tails.

[71:27]

So, those are all dharmas. Those are the dharmas that we're made out of. Anyway. Because I was thinking of something, you know. Because Abhidhamma, this is quasi-Abhidhamma. It's not real Abhidhamma. I'm just using this without an appellation. But I thought that when people see Abhidhamma, they go, oh my god, you know, mists and mists of darkness. And I myself was never attracted to Abhidhamma. But I first thought, oh my god, because the way it's presented in the literature is repetitions and repetitions and repetitions.

[72:30]

You know, you repeat a lot of the same line and then And the reason for that is because in India, in the old days, written word was not so common and people memorized. So the Abhidharma was set up in a way that was very repetitious in order to make it like a sing-song so that people could memorize it. But we, you know, write it all out. Writing for us is very common, so we would rather see the written word than sing the Habidamma over and over again. So when you read that sing-song stuff, it just seems like stupid repetition. And I was totally turned off by that.

[73:33]

Little by little I know that, especially after reading Master Huang's presentation of Vassa Vandu, the connection between Abhidhamma and Mahayana Abhidhamma, which is a little more, talks more about emptiness and reality. I could see how, because I'm interested in the study of the eight consciousnesses. I'm very interested in that. And the way the dharmas and the eight consciousnesses come together was very interesting to me. And so that's why I wanted to present that. There's also the sixth consciousness of the mind.

[74:44]

The mind knows smells and the mind perceives thought bubbles or something like that. So where does that fit into this? That's the sixth consciousness. So that is the mono-vision. So there's also the collection of the five sense consciousnesses. So it's sort of like the thoughts are Aren't they actually different? It's the consciousness that discriminates between the sense consciousnesses. It is the sense consciousness. It's the consciousness of all the senses. When you say... Japan, they considered the mind just to be another sense organ, like the eyes, and what the mind sensed was thoughts. Well, which mind do you mean?

[75:47]

Well, the sense of us having six senses rather than just five senses. Yes. Well, yeah, people say six senses, but the sixth sense, right? Well, this is like the difference between Eastern thought and Western as if he isn't that Western thought. But this way of individuating is not careless. So the sixth level of consciousness is associated with the five sense consciousnesses. But it's not a sense consciousness. It's the individuating consciousness of the senses. Individuating? Meaning, this is seeing, this is hearing, this is touching, this is smelling.

[76:51]

You say, oh wow, what a great aroma. That's the sixth consciousness that's saying that. in sort of this very simplistic way that the mind is just another one of the sense organs and what it senses is thoughts. I think that's a different mind than the sixth consciousness. We don't talk about mind. We just talk about consciousness. I just want to remember this, this is a little different, but when the eight consciousnesses are turned, then the wisdoms take the place of a self. So we say, well, what's left?

[77:52]

If there's no self, what is it that does it? out of self. Whatever our actions are come out of wisdom instead of out of self. So wisdom takes the place of a false self. If one sees with their ears and smells with their eyes, The six countries are just mixed up. That's it. It's like. I think that's illustrating the non-differentiation of direction perceiving.

[79:20]

So would that be like the seventh consciousness transform into wisdom? I don't know. I don't want to speculate. But I understand your question. But there's a koan to that. Yeah, when Pilgrim woke up, he said, now I see that when you understand, something like that, paraphrasing, when you see through your nose and smell through your eyes and accept, I want to know, but I can't remember. I think so. Can I follow up on Koh's question? Yes. I was reading a novel the other day. And this character in the novel was, there were two blind characters. And one of them had a damaged organ.

[80:27]

So what kind of? A damaged organ. Their eyes didn't work. The other one, they decided by testing Actually, the eye worked fine. The organ worked fine. But the mind, the consciousness, was not able to create perception. So there was a damage in the mind consciousness. Now, when you said to Ko, I think what you said was, when you were talking about nose, it's like, oh, what a wonderful aroma. Now, isn't that actually a manifestation of the interaction of Mano Vijnana and Manas? The discrimination of the wonderful aspect of it is that that's the discriminating action of the separate consciousness. Manas and Mano Vijnana are very much connected. They're not that separate.

[81:28]

Because Manas is a support for Mano Vijnana. Right. So the monovigilante is like a classifying activity, not an evaluative activity. It may not. I don't know. This is a very tricky area, about how far the monovigilante goes in making judgments. Because the monovigilante also is a thinking consciousness. But I thought the same thing when I said that, that committing a judgment on this is good, I like it, right? But it's hard to say. I like it, really. Is that ego, or is it simply a statement of a feeling? But if the motto of Ishiyama wasn't functioning, you would have no way of

[82:32]

It's making any kind of perception. It's like that character novel. You wouldn't get what was coming into your nose to go to the brain. Right. And we can look at that. How much time do we have? We're actually serving five minutes past the past five minutes. We're over our schedule. Whatever you would like to do is fine. We'll leave it there. But I just want to say that the 5 sense consciousnesses are an entity. The 6 sense consciousness is consciousnesses are the doorways for sensory perception. And the sixth consciousness is the perceptor.

[83:36]

It's like formations, perceptions. Well, I just want to say that the sixth consciousnesses are the perceptors, are the doorways. You know, you walk in the door and you and someone greet you. That's the He says, oh, coal. This is coal. That's gold. That's light. But he walked in the hallway and through the door. As a sense of consciousness, realized the end of Woody Allen. And we're going through this. That's no fair.

[84:37]

You don't remember that? Oh, my God. Did you hear of it? Yeah. It's a $20 movie where all these guys are dressed up as sperm. And then they have to beat you. And it's, OK, everybody get in. And then he shoots them off. I was just curious. I don't know how to ask this, but what trouble does mono-consciousness cause when it's defiled by mono? Well, maybe it starts judging.

[85:46]

I don't know. It's a good question. It's a very good question. I'd like to research that one. I can't say that I know. But it's a good question. What are the problems that Manas has when, I mean, Madhavijaya has, when Manas is, you know, Well, it's easy, just think about it yourself. Your perception, how do you perceive what comes through your senses? Do you perceive what comes through your senses accurately? Or do you see what comes through your senses in a tainted way? In other words, through partiality. As a matter of fact, that's really great. It opens that whole thing up. Because what we see through partiality is not what is real. So even though we have input through our senses, you know, like you say, sometimes

[86:56]

We say, oh, I know what that is. I've heard that a thousand times. But you're not hearing it. Because you're saying, I've heard that a thousand times. But you've never heard it before. You just think you've heard it before because there was something like that that you heard. It seems exactly the same. So, what you hear, do you hear it directly or do you hear it tainted with what you think you're hearing? I think that's how mana, mana vijnana is influenced by mana. Because we don't hear it as it really is. We don't see it as it really is. We don't feel it as it really is. So, you know, when you take peyote, Because there's this magic thing where you really see something as you think as it is. You touch something because that's the senses of having done that before.

[88:00]

It's cut off. So I'm not saying you should do that. You probably already did. You can read about that exact sense in the library. Exactly. Yeah. So, you know. We don't see things freshly always. Sometimes we do. After you go swimming, you have a great sense of sensory perception. And after you do certain... We were talking about exercise and running and all that. That kind of clears up your senses, but we're foggy. And the sense of repetition, we get tired. We cut off things, you know. I already say that. We compartmentalize and shut off a lot of our sensory perceptions. So when manas become purified and the sensory perceptions become very crisp and clear,

[89:13]

And we don't say, I hear something. We say, something is heard. There is hearing. Hearing is heard something. When we sit Zazen, we don't say, I am sitting Zazen. There is his body sitting on a black cushion. Just painful legs sitting on a black cushion. And as Ross said, when the sixth consciousness is purified, then you can hear through your eyes. And I won't explain how, because I don't know. I had a good time.

[90:24]

Oh, and before. First thing first. Before. Go ahead. Before you leave, I want to. Thank Jake for guiding us through the Sistine. And Alan and... There's still something. I know, there's still something. But I can still thank people before they ask. It's easier for me to do it this way. And Leslie. Gary, too. Oh, Gary. He's not here today. It's been all of us for being here.

[91:34]

Can we thank you for the teaching? If you want to, yes.

[91:38]

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