I vow to taste the truth of the Sacred Testament. So this is the third of our four classes, right? Yeah. and last time I think we got as far as looking at the first I was with a friend who was on his way to teach a class tonight, too, on the Talmud.

[01:30]

It made me reflect on the similarity between religious literature and the process of reading religious literature in general. At the same time, I'm also studying, as I'm studying of Ernest Hemingway and the Great Gatsby. Scott Fitzgerald was a whole other kind of literature, right? So I'm on my way over here in the traffic. I was speculating and thinking about the difference between I have to tell you that after you mentioned that, I went back and dug out the short stories of Hemingway. What was I telling you last week? You told me you were going to teach it, and I could sort of remember that I had read them, but I couldn't really bring a lot, you know, just little snatches. So I went back and read the three stories you were going to be able to teach.

[02:33]

But then once I got that volume in my hands, so I'm better prepared to take the high school class you're teaching. I always find it a very deep thing to keep coming back to this sutra or other Buddhist literature because, first of all, there are certain terms and themes and concepts that are always the same and approach from a slightly different angle. a new twist. And so if you've been studying this kind of literature for a long time, you take the light and then you find a depth in that kind of repetition and looking at something over and over again from different angles.

[03:39]

But in addition to that is the fact that not only is there that intellectual interest or philosophical interest, but also then you enacting or bringing out another side of the literature, and you're bringing that experience also to bear on the reading of the text. So there's this dynamic interplay between your understanding, your philosophical or intellectual understanding, and your experience of trying to put what you're reading into practice. And you know, even though Zen, sort of the motivating force behind the original founding of the Zen school, I believe, was to strip down, strip away intellectualization and study in a way, and say, just look at this experience.

[04:52]

This is more important than study and all this intellectualization. I am becoming a little bit revisionist, I think, in my later years here, and feeling as if I respect that spirit, sir. There doesn't seem to be too much difference in a way between what you're thinking and what you're practicing, what you're, the rest of, you know, you're breathing and you're moving and your emotions and so on are not as, it's not as if thinking is somewhere over there and it's irrelevant and over here you have your practice with your body and with your emotions and otherwise. No, it's all kind of mixed up. And what you think about and how you think has to do with, you know, how you practice with your emotions. body and everything else in your life. So I think that there is a serious advantage to be had in understanding something for your practice, not just, it's just an intellectual thing, but it actually influences your practice.

[05:54]

For instance, there are a lot of teachings, I was at Green Gulch, I gave a lecture last Sunday, and somebody asked about anger, and they said, well, even though I understand, you know, about time and so I'm frustrated. So when I investigated with them a little further, they allowed us how the fact is that they are less swept up in it and less bowled over by it now than they were say one or two or three years ago. And that in fact, the fact that they understand more about anger intellectually in their mind has helped them to some extent to work with it a little better. And that they came to realize, as we were dialoguing about this, that, well, they have made some progress and they're working with anger, and maybe if they have some patience and keep working on it, they can work with anger in more fundamental ways as they go along.

[07:01]

So my point is that an understanding of what they were doing was not irrelevant to their practice. So I think that's true of sutra study in general, any kind of study in general. your study is deeper if you practice and have experience with it. And then, you know, as we read a sutra like this, we're kind of always trying to extract from it, what does this have to do with our practice? So how can we understand this thing that may seem really far out and irrelevant in a way? Suppose that this was written by practitioners like you and I, what are they really trying to say here? And so we can look at it that way too. So anyway, that's going to be general. I think about that too sometimes, and I haven't really studied much of the Buddhist literature. This is a great opportunity, but it seems like I could only think about my practice in terms of some of the ideas in the literature in retrospect only, like in memory, thinking back to my practice, some experiences I've had.

[08:14]

It seems like while one is practicing, like sitting in a sasheen, it's just, for me, it seems really difficult to... Yeah, right. Yeah, I don't think that that's the time that one would be reflecting on one's study at that point. Yeah. But nevertheless, the study that you've done has influenced your mind, and the mind that is engaged in sasheen is a mind that has been influenced review or study or something like that. Although there are meditation practices that do that, but that is not the practice in Zen. Zen emphasizes a different style of meditation. Well, I feel it does make my zazen, affect my zazen when I'm reading this. And I feel as if I'm reading it with a kind of great cosmic background.

[09:25]

And there's something very buoyant and enormous and positive about this that I find very encouraging. Yeah, no, I think so. In fact, at Green Gulch this last week when I was doing the Avatamsaka Sutra class, I brought in, I didn't bring it this time, there's a new book out, Cultivating the Empty Field. Have you seen that book? It's a North Point book, yeah. And that book includes talks about Zazen given by a 13th century or 12th century Chinese Zen teacher, Soto Zen teacher named Ongzi. And I brought that book in and read some of his little talks as an example of somebody giving Zazen instruction based exactly on this feeling and spirit of the Upatamsaka Sutra. The whole name of that line of teaching is called Silent Illumination. And the word illumination really comes from the spirit of the Avatamska Sutra, of the shedding of light.

[10:32]

And he talks about wandering into the circle of light and things like that. So he talks about Zazen as entering into the experience while he doesn't use the imagery. See, the imagery in the sutra is entirely kind of imagery, but the spirit and the feeling of when you sit in Zazen, you're entering into a vast and kind of cosmic space beyond your own human personality and your own individual problems that you can actually, if you can turn around, as he puts it, and turn your, and Dogen also echoes this, if you can take the backward step and turn your light inwardly to illuminate the self, if you can make that shift, while you're not encouraging the imagery and so on of the sutra, that space, that feeling of spaciousness and of light and of going beyond the conceivable human possibilities is very much the feeling of Hongsi's teaching and Dogen's teaching and so on.

[11:45]

So I brought that up in the other class to illustrate the fact that there is definitely that flavor and that spirit in Zen teaching, although you don't see it as much in the Later development in Zen literature, the Koan collections, which were a particular style of literature that didn't show that side as much. But it's there throughout Zen, and particularly it's there in Soto Zen. I think I mentioned this in the beginning of the class. I talked about how Soto Zen, Shikantaza was particularly based on the feeling and sense of the Amitabha Sutra. So I think it really does influence your Zazen, but it doesn't, it's not as if you would But as you've said, this is the realm of the Bodhisattvas, not the humans. They get to see all these multitudinous... Or our experience is maybe just spacious.

[13:01]

Yeah, well, but... They get to see the movie and we just... Well, but the Bodhisattvas are not. We don't want to impute independent existence to these Bodhisattvas, right? We don't want to imagine that there are other beings besides us that are seeing this or doing this. No, I think it's clearly the sense of it. bodhisattvas as well. It's not somewhere else that this is taking place. I'm really interested in knowing more about the historical context in which this arose, because I was in the intuition that maybe this is, at least on one level, rather compensatory to what was really happening with the human world. I was curious if you could speak to that. How do you mean? Well, I'm just sort of interested in history, I guess. I was just interested in the time and what was happening in the culture.

[14:03]

It's really quite fabulous. My intuition is that the human dilemma was probably pretty much the opposite. I couldn't really answer that because I'm not so knowledgeable about historical circumstances. And also, it's hard to answer since exactly when it was composed and where. Whether it ever existed in the Sanskrit or not, nobody really knows. But my intuition has always been, not so much what you're saying, but rather that it was like, I think that there was this kind of reactive spirit, there was a reaction in Buddhism, I think, to the austere kind of spirit of the older teaching, which came to be more like, you know, let's drop everything little by little and sort of narrow down the field, and then finally burn out our candle, blow out our candle and disappear.

[15:18]

That was the way that Buddhism looked at a certain point in history. And I think there was, and it was also, and the Buddha did that too. The Buddha also had, narrowed down his field of life until he blew out his candle. And he's gone, too, completely. So I think there was a reaction against that. There was a more of a feeling of expansiveness and also a tremendous devotion to the Buddha and a real need on the part of practitioners to deny that the Buddha had passed away, that there was no residue of the Buddha anymore in this world. It was not something that people really wanted to think about. And then that started up with the Mahayana, and then I think it was a kind of a gradual... I mean, this is... I'm making this up, right? Sounds good. Yes. A gradual, you know, kind of one-upmanship, you know. You know, you turn it on its head, and you make it far out, and you make it a little more far out, and a little more, and a little more, and pretty soon you really get carried away, and really go as far as you could possibly go.

[16:25]

And to me, the Avatamsaka Sutra is about as far as you could go. And expanding, and turning the teaching on its head, and expanding it, a ritualization and an enactment of this basic material here. And tantras, to me, come out of the same space and the same feeling. So that's what I always imagined. But, I mean, you could be right. I really don't know what the But I think these sutras came at a time when Buddhism was really flourishing and was at its highest development. So, I don't know. Does anybody know any historical information? I don't know. This is on a different track.

[17:25]

I really got interested in the word, refulgence. Because, for one thing, it's an ugly word. in a couple of different sources, and it just sort of fit with the whole sutra because it said radiating and reflecting at the same time, which is just sort of mind-blowing to begin with. And then I thought, well, now, where in science does this happen? And I went to my scientific son-in-law, and he got all... And it doesn't exist as a scientific term at all. And then I wondered about the translation and what, you know, if you know anything about the term outside of... Yeah, I'm sorry, I don't know. I mean, it's a little hard to... get too involved in the English words because they may not... I know, that's why I was asking.

[18:29]

And I don't know, I actually don't know what the Sanskrit word is that he's translating. But it sort of fits with that whole thing, that idea of turning the radiation, radiance inside. Yeah, right. The word glory, you know, is empty word in English now, but glory is refulgence, glory is a kind of glowing, reflecting glowing light, that is, so that there were, you know, angels would have glory, would be surrounded by glory in the mythology of the Bible, and mystics would see clouds of glory. Word's word. In the prelude, there's one moment in the prelude when he sees, coming up over the hill, he sees this kind of glory. It appears and it transforms his life. And he has that phrase, trailing clouds of glory. So yeah, but it doesn't exist as a physical phenomenon only in the heart.

[19:30]

So, anyway. onward. The stage is here, on page 68. The seventh stage, the stage called Far Going. He begins to describe this stage. He goes through the ten perfections as they're practiced in the seventh stage. And Moon of Liberation asks him, are all the elements of enlightenment fulfilled moment to moment only by enlightening beings in the seventh stage or in all ten stages?

[20:36]

Because it sounds like, as he's describing this, the seventh stage And Diamond Matrix then, in talking about the seven stage reviews, all the previous stages, so I thought it would be interesting to look at this paragraph here on the bottom of 68. It's wonderful the way, all the elements of enlightenment are fulfilled moment to moment by enlightening beings in all ten stages, but especially in the seven stages. So it's kind of funny because it's always like that. All the stages include all the other stages, so we can't say that, you know, why in this stage of Enlightened Beings fulfills practice that involves appropriate efforts and accede to the practice of knowledge and mystic knowledge. Now in the first stage, and here's the review, now in the first stage of Enlightened Beings, the elements of enlightenment are fulfilled in the Enlightened Beings moment to moment by focus on all vows.

[21:43]

So the original practice of vowing and barking on the path deciding to do it. And the joy that comes with that is the first stage. And this is, you know, some people, for those of us who do have this kind of experience, it's a wonderful thing, you know, when you suddenly realize, aha, this is a real thing here. We can do this. This is great. The possibilities are wonderful. And then one feels reborn, like I said. So then, in the second, by removal of mental defilements, and the second one, remember, is the precepts practice, morality practice. In the third, by increasing commitment and attainment of the illumination of the teaching, and that's the refulgence, the third stage is refulgence, where we practice the jhanic practices, the trance practices. In the fourth, by entry into the path,

[22:44]

And the fourth is the one where we practice mindfulness, the four right efforts, the faculties, the five faculties, the five powers, and the seven limbs of enlightenment. We enter the path there. And the fifth, by going along with worldly occupations, the fifth one is the one where we realize the fourth noble truth and emptiness. And therefore, we're free to go beyond the restraints of the second and third stages where we're practicing discipline and meditation. Now we can freely enter into everything. And then the sixth by entry into the door of the teaching of profundity. And that one, remember, was the ten ways of analyzing the twelvefold chain of causation. So, once we re-recognize emptiness for what it is, and see things as they are, we then see the multiplicity of it, and the detail of it, in the sixth stage. Now, this seventh stage, all the elements of enlightenment are fulfilled moment to moment by the establishment of all qualities of Buddha.

[23:52]

What is the reason for this? All the elements of effort to evoke knowledge that are accomplished by enlightened beings in the first through seven stages are accomplished without effort beginning in the eighth stage and on until the final end. So this is what characterizes these seven stages, that it's the final stage of effort, it's the fruition of all effort. So in a way, if you think about it, each one of these stages basically is enlightenment. But then the next one seems to go further somehow, even though the previous one is complete. So these seven all constitute a kind of a unit, and the seventh one completes the stage where effort is required. So in other words, it's sort of like the first seven stages are training stages. After this seventh stage, all kinds of activity is going on, and all kinds of perfections are being realized. But they just sort of happen. naturally, without any effort on the part of the Bodhisattvas.

[24:55]

So then there's all these metaphors. There's two worlds, one defiled and one impure, and there's a gap between the alloyed and the pure. And it is impossible to close that gap except by the empowerment of great vows, skill and means, and higher mystic knowledge. So, in this stage, before the Avatamsaka Sutra, there was the concept of the six paramitas, which is the one that is most studied and most known about. Giving, morality, patience, energy, meditation, and wisdom, prajna, wisdom. So now the seven through ten stages begin to add four more paramitas onto the old list of six. And the paramitas that are now added are skill and means, which is the ability to be appropriate for whatever the situation is.

[26:10]

Vows, which is the power of one's intention. and commitment. And the next one is power. It's called power. And power means the ability to overcome all obstacles and usually is associated with great eloquence and the ability to explain things based on beings' knowledge. It's something pretty like skill and means, but it seems to be particularly having to do with overcoming obstacles. And the last one is knowledge of the way things actually are. But that, of course, is also what the sixth one is. So it's like they add a whole other layer. Here, from the seventh through the tenth stages, and with those extra practices thrown into the sixth paramita, there's a whole other layer of practices being added. The sutra doesn't really say this, but it seems to me as if

[27:14]

The idea being conveyed here is that, yes, in the sixth stage, with the sixth paramita, with the realization of emptiness, with the realization of wisdom, this is a kind of completion. And yet, we can go beyond this when we expand this completion to be able to appropriately respond to all sentient beings and enlighten everybody. be able to dispel all obstacles, then our knowledge and wisdom almost is on a different plane in the 10th stage of the Bodhisattva. So somehow, what's the difference between wisdom, the 6th, and knowledge, the 10th? In a way, there's no difference. It's the same thing that we're being wise about or knowing. And yet, somehow there's a more grandeur and more magnification in the 10th stage than there is in the 6th stage. And they're big about it, in the sense that they wouldn't say it's different, but it seems to be different.

[28:19]

on all beings. Yeah, I think that's good. That's part of it. That's definitely the dimension. Of course, from the very beginning, the desire and commitment to work for the benefit of beings is the very first thing that happens. But yeah, I think it comes out more in these later stages. And even in the A stage, it says, and we'll come to that passage in a minute, something like, at this stage, we're not talking about the practice of an individual. anymore. We're talking about vast arrays of people. The bodhisattva in the eighth stage is not a person. It's maybe a being that's created out of a hole. Many, many persons. So anyway, this is a little bit, as we're leading into the seventh through the tenth stages here. And then going on with this metaphor, it says that it's like the difference between the seventh stage and the eighth stage, and the three later stages that will follow, is that it's like a king riding around on an elephant, recognizing people's afflictions and suffering and so on, poverty, without being affected by it.

[29:49]

And yet he is still in the human condition. Even though he's not affected by it, he could be affected by it. He still shares the same nature as the other beings. But, if the same king were to leave the human body, ascend to the Brahma Palace, in that case, he would be fundamentally different from the other beings. He would not even be human anymore. And that's the difference. Bodhisattva in the 8th, 9th, and 10th stages no longer is even human, no longer is even, doesn't have to make effort anymore, and can't backslide, is beyond accruing karma that would make them go backwards in the path. So this is a real dividing line. So yet, in the enlightened beings in this 7th stage, have mostly transcended the mass of all afflictions, beginning with greed.

[30:55]

Enlightened beings practicing this seventh stage, far going, cannot be said either to be defiled with affliction or to be free of affliction." So, in this stage, they haven't yet gone to that, gone beyond. But neither can they be said to be subject to affliction. Why? Because they do not act out any afflictions. they cannot be said to be afflicted. Because they are seeking Buddha knowledge and have not yet completely fulfilled their aspiration, they cannot be said to be without affliction. So, they share that they still have the possibility of affliction, but they don't really. They're too smart at this point to get caught in it. So, that's a nice possibility for us. We should think about that. It wouldn't be that nice to be, you know, inhuman. be able to have afflictions, just to be friendly, but not to be caught in it, so that we can be friendly and not have unpleasant circumstances at the same time.

[32:04]

So, anyway, they attain, in this stage, wonderful concentrations, unlimited actions, and they also attain, on page 70, biggest paragraph, but it ends with, thoroughly purified is the manifestation of acceptance of the non-origination of all things. And this issue of the acceptance of the non-origination of all things is really important. In fact, we won't read this in our class here, but in the subsequent chapters, there's a chapter on the ten acceptances. that the Bodhisattvas practice. And one of them is the acceptance of the non-origination of all things. And this is really important. This is what I talked about at Green Gulch on last Sunday. This is really an important issue, a very deep one.

[33:10]

The non-origination In a sense, the phantom, as it says in the sutra, the phantom-like nature of all things, the mirage-like quality of all things, that things, in fact, although we believe that things came to be and are now here and will pass away, in fact, this is not really so. Things have never really originated and they really don't pass away. They're simply transformations of consciousness. And when we understand that, we can have a tremendous acceptance of things just as they are, which then enables us to work for the benefit of ourself and others without getting tired, discouraged, and pissed off. Because there's a lot of frustration, of course, in working with our own mind and with others' minds. Why does the manifestation of this acceptance need to be purified? Well, it means that... I think how I read that is that

[34:14]

they really got it at this stage. You know what I mean? Not that it's, you know, before this stage they haven't completely manifested this acceptance, but here they purified means manifested completely without any confusion. That's how I take it. So anyway, and this is a real hard one. I had a lot of questions about it, because a lot of people don't like that idea, because they think that to accept the perfection of things as they are, with all the suffering and confusion that there is right now, strikes a lot of people as not something that we want to do. So don't we need to not accept it so that we can change it and fix it? And this is certainly a worthy point of view, but I think that, as I understand the teaching of this sutra, it is saying, in fact, to fundamentally change things and help things along in this world in a way that's going to really be lasting and is really going to matter in the end, one has to really accept things as they are and come from that place in working to change things and in working to turn the world around.

[35:33]

And that, in fact, You can't really do it. You don't have the spirit and the energy to do it unless you have that acceptance. That's not to say that we drop our attempts to change our own mind and the minds of others while we're waiting to become seventh stage bodhisattvas. But I think we're working on both at the same time and appreciating the need to accept the non-origination of all things. It's interesting. I watched a movie last week on the video machine. called Ron. Did you ever see Ron? It's a great Japanese movie, a Kira Kurosawa movie. And it's a typical Japanese Buddhist movie from a completely Buddhist point of view. And I've seen many Japanese movies like this, particularly about the feudal period in Japan where everybody was knocking off everybody right and left. Unmitigated tragedy, you know. And basically the moral of the story is, you are stupid and they create this kind of karma, and once they get into it, it's inevitable that it's going to play itself out.

[36:37]

And only by leaving the world and worshipping the Buddha is there going to be any peace at all. So that was basically what this movie was talking about. But the part that I thought was really great was that every now and then, in the midst of these horrible sufferings and betrayals and all that, the old man, who was this central In his old age, it all came back on him to roost. Anyway, he would, every now and then, look up at the sky. Do you remember that? And he would see the clouds. And it was very moving because the clouds were always different. I mean, it wasn't real obvious. It wasn't like there were dark clouds and then when things were worse and the clouds got darker every time or anything like that. It was just shots of the clouds. And this was repeated. And I thought, well, that's very like this saying here, because this was his clause.

[37:44]

All these horrible tragedies that were happening were inevitable transformations of mind that were occurring in the human realm from the standpoint of... One of the characters in the film is a devotee of Amida Buddha, and so she is a kind of satanic character who doesn't hate and doesn't isn't seeking revenge, all the other characters are doing all this. So this is from the point of view of Amida Buddha, all this is clouds changing and transforming and so on. So that's how we view conditioned things when we have acceptance of their true non-origination. It lasts a while when you see those clouds moving.

[38:49]

And I forget now how he does it, but I think that when those pictures of the clouds appear on the movie, there is no sound. It's quiet. And you just see these clouds, and it's a great relief from the unmitigated disaster that seems to happen, burning down everything. Isn't that the movie where they saw that red? The red in the blood is the most gorgeous red you have ever seen. Well, there's several. There's a red one, there's a yellow one. I think there's a black one, too. But the blood gets to be the most beautiful red of anything. Right. Yeah. But it's Macbeth, isn't it? It's Lear. The old guys couldn't live without Lear. But that's a big difference, too, because in Lear you get that lightning and thunder. I mean, the sky is completely different. So anyway, I just wanted to point that out.

[39:57]

Acceptance of the non-origination of all things is something to contemplate. That's on page 70, three quarters of the way down at the end of that large paragraph. The unlimited actions of enlightening beings in the seventh stage are carried on without specific marks as are their unlimited speech and thought. In other words, totally free. We don't know. There's nothing that characterizes their behavior or their speech. Yeah. It seems sort of like, you know, at this point they've extinguished their egos enough that they can be completely sort of reflective and fluid. Yes. And that really comes into being able to teach and just be completely appropriate to, not quite to the point where they've snuffed out the candle, as you said, but to this point of and not having boundaries. Yes, exactly. So, then I think it's interesting here on 71.

[41:00]

From what stage do enlightened beings arrive at extinction? This is nirvana, the blowing out of the candle. At what stage do they arrive at this? They arrive at extinction from the sixth stage. In the seventh stage, they enter and emerge from extinction in each mental instant. but they may not be said to actually experience extinction. Because of that, they are said to have inconceivable physical, verbal, and mental action. It is a marvel how enlightened beings abide in ultimate reality without actually experiencing extinction." So, then it goes on to say that they manifest themselves in the ordinary mundane world, even though they're untouched by it. So this is the power in this enter and emerge from extinction on each moment. So they're constantly entering and leaving nirvana. Which of course, from the standpoint of the original teaching of nirvana, it was an irreversible thing.

[42:08]

But here it's seen to be a moment-to-moment experience, turning toward the light, toward the dark, moment by moment. And the practice here is skill in means. Of the ten paramitas, the practice associated with the seven stages is skill in means. Then follows the usual verses. They enter quadrillion concentrations and so on. If you remember, each stage a quadrillion concentration, see a quadrillion Buddhas and recognize their powers, shake a quadrillion worlds, go to a quadrillion lands, illumine a quadrillion worlds, develop a quadrillion beings to maturity, live for a quadrillion eons and so on.

[43:13]

And then Diamond Matrix speaks in verse recapitulation of all the teachings that he has given previous to that. And then after his verse is spoken, the gods and celestial hosts become joyful and make offerings and throw flowers, banners and pennants, aromatic powders, precious cloth, many splendid parasols studded with jewels and exquisite clouds of pearl necklaces. The goddesses produce many kinds of music with pleasing sweet sounds and superb rhythm. And they offer all those to the Buddhas and in addition to that they tell a poem. which ends, concludes the seventh stage. And just as soon as they're done with that, the Moon of Liberation, who sort of speaks for them, says, please tell us the way into the practice of the eighth stage. And Diamond Matrix goes into that. Those who have well accomplished investigation of the seven stages of enlightened beings, who have purified the path, and so on and so on.

[44:19]

It gives the sort of preconditions. So each stage, as is always the case in Buddhist practice, when they're giving you a progression of stages, they always say, the realization of this particular stage is itself propelling you into the next stage. And you come to see as part of realization of this stage, the unsatisfactoriness of it and the need to refine still further. So it's as if there's an endless stepping into new stages, coming to realize something, and then as part of that realization, coming to understand that there's a further refinement to be accomplished. And of course, although they give to refinements that we can practice as we go along. So it's a never-ending evolution.

[45:20]

This eighth stage happens when the They realize the non-birth, signlessness, absence of becoming or annihilation, non-consummation, non-progression, non-regression, essential non-existence, equality of beginning, middle and end, which refers to the path, equality of the beginning, middle and end of the path. There is no progression. and non-conceptuality of all things, accessible to non-conceptual universal knowledge, equal to thusness. They realize these qualities of all things as they really are. They are wholly detached from mind, intellect, consciousness, thought and mediation, unattached, not grasping, equal to space, having entered into the nature of openness. This is called having attained acceptance of the non-origination of things, like we were talking about a minute ago.

[46:21]

So it's by virtue of that And isn't it interesting that it's an acceptance? It's not an achievement. It's not an attainment of any sort. It's accepting. And to me this is very deep, that one accepts things. It's a kind of sense of giving up. Not leaping forward so much as it is taking a deep breath and letting go of everything and seeing that things are as they are. So it's a kind of acceptance, and yet it is a transformation, because with such an acceptance, there's a sort of transcendent ability to understand things and harmonize with things. And they use the word openness, which is wonderful. It doesn't say anything about awareness either. It doesn't say an awareness, which would have to come before acceptance, right? You have to be aware of this thing and then somehow be able to accept it. Well, don't forget, though, that in the previous stage, see emptiness and the multiplicity of things.

[47:23]

So, I mean, we're primed for this, right? It's not like it's coming cold. We've done a lot of stuff already. But, yeah, what you bring up is an interesting point, honey, in that it's almost as if awareness is too removed. Awareness, you know, is too To be aware of something is almost to be removed from it. But it requires effort, too. And it requires effort, yeah. This is acceptance. We could be talking about the awareness of the non-origination of things. But this talks about awareness of it. It talks about acceptance of it. Which assumes awareness over time. So anyway, this full attainment of this acceptance is to be in the stage of immovability.

[48:31]

It's effortless, as we said before. All the outflows are dried up, as it says in the next paragraph. And in these enlightened beings, no action based on views, passions or intentions are manifest. So there is no shadow whatsoever of desire. Just like you were saying, there's no more ego grasping at all. No more views that we're trying to make reality conform to. And not even any intentions, any propelling... And all these things, you know, when you kind of think about it, views, passions and intentions, all are about projecting into the future. They're all about creating an ongoingness of life. into the future. But the Bodhisattva in this stage has no need of that. There is no need at this stage to go on into the future.

[49:34]

There's an acceptance of the fact that past, present and future all fail to originate anyway. And that there is only just facing the moment that we're alive with complete acceptance of its fundamental nature of non-origination. So there's something very deep and very peaceful about what's being said here. However, despite all this, the beings in the eighth stage are not fully Buddhas yet. Furthermore, you have only this one illumination. absence of false ideas about it. But such illuminations of Buddhas are endless in extent, endless in action, endless in manifestation. So in other words, in the eighth stage, the Bodhisattvas don't have any false, they don't make a false move, no mistakes.

[50:35]

They're absolutely there with reality, without any projection or any kind of confusion. But this is still not do that, but in addition, they have illuminations that are endless in extent, endless in action, endless in manifestation, their number being incalculable and immeasurable. So the Buddhists seem to have a creative power here, that the Bodhisattva in this stage lacks. It's as if, as human beings, we have a very mixed-up kind of need to get it done and do something and make it happen. Completely clear and pure without that. But then a Buddha has an enlightened creativity which manifests in calculable manifestations, but totally clear without the extra kind of karmic twist that makes for confusion in other beings.

[51:43]

So that's the difference here between an eighth stage Bodhisattva and a Buddha. And here is the part that says, in the last paragraph on 78, I tell you, if the Buddhas did not introduce the Enlightened Beings this way, into ways of effecting omniscient knowledge, the Enlightened Beings would become completely extinct in Parinirvana and would cease all work for sentient beings. So it's this creative power of the Buddha that keeps the Bodhisattva Therefore, the Buddhas give the Enlightened Beings such infinite tasks to develop knowledge, the knowledge-producing deeds effected in a single instant of which are immeasurably, incalculably greater than all former undertakings from the first inspiration up to the attainment of stability in the seventh stage. Why? Because previously it was practice undertaken with one body. Whereas, having climbed to this stage, the power of practice of Enlightened Beings is realized by infinite different bodies.

[52:45]

So this is interesting because at this stage we no longer think of our practice as I am practicing. That conception of my practice and I'm practicing and working on my practice goes out the window. And we understand our being as the eighth stage of bodhisattva, as being the being of all the people in the universe practicing Buddha's way, which is everybody. So our identity literally is trans-physical. And we are, what we understand to be our practice in Eighth Stage Bodhisattvas is all existence, many different bodies, infinite voices, infinite knowledge and so on. So that's another characteristic of this Eighth Stage. So here, for many pages here, they understand the creation and dissolution of worlds, they understand the vast differentiation of things, permeate a billion world universes, and they manifest their teaching according to the beings in all the worlds.

[54:01]

They achieve They become well-established in willpower, determination, compassion, elocution. They can't turn back. In 83 it says, this eighth stage of enlightened beings, in the first paragraph, is called immovable because the enlightened beings cannot be deflected from their course. It is called a stage of non-regression because of the non-regression of knowledge. It is called a stage difficult to reach because of being difficult for any worldlings to know. and so on. So this is pivotal here. So that's what it says about the eighth stage. And then the same thing, Diamond Matrix recites the verses. The Goddesses give a lot of gifts. This thing and so on. If you have anything you wanted to bring up, here, as we pass.

[55:26]

Yeah, I got a feeling you could spend the whole time on the first page if you wanted to. One thing that comes up in my mind about the difference between awareness and acceptance is that awareness of something is like things are happening seemingly outside of ourselves and awareness for me is like my projection out and I want to be aware of something and the accepting of which is kind of how we deal with life or at least starting out you know being aware practices and whatnot, and the idea of acceptance is very passive, but actually it takes a lot and it's a different kind of energy that's being addressed and attended to. I think this is a really good distinction between awareness and acceptance, and it's one that I would like us to rather than feel that we will exhaustively discuss this tonight, it would be good to actually keep this in mind and think about this.

[56:31]

Because I think that awareness practice is very, very important and very fundamental to Zen practice and to Buddhist practice in general. And yet, there's this other side that awareness practice also has its limitations. And that, just like all these other stages, we ought to see the culmination of awareness would be, in a sense, go beyond awareness. Because awareness does have this shadow of I am being aware of, or there is a consciousness that is aware of an object. And in the end, what we want in a way, a real affection and love to be with and as something, rather than be over here being aware of it. But it begins with awareness practice, and I think there's a rhythm. If we only emphasize that side, then we could be fooling ourselves, because we may not be A Stage Bodhisattvas with the true acceptance of the non-origination of things.

[57:41]

So I think we need to continue to practice awareness practice. The other side of that is to drop awareness practice also. So let's keep that in our minds and continue to contemplate awareness and acceptance as two modes. That's one of the first things that came to me when I thought of it too. The awareness conjures up the mind and acceptance goes right to the heart. I think awareness also has a special pitfall for us because I think that practitioners who emphasize awareness practice a lot are actually becoming self-conscious, rather than necessarily aware. If you become self-conscious, you think you're becoming aware of mental states, but what you're actually doing is worrying about yourself a lot, evaluating. your states of mind and getting it down on yourself or whatever.

[58:42]

That whole mechanism kicks in because we're so conditioned to see things from the standpoint of our egotistical self that it's hard to do awareness practice without falling into that. But Buddhist awareness practice is all about going beyond egotistical self and being aware of mental phenomena as they arise and pass away without interposing. What are the effects of awareness practice on karma versus acceptance practice on karma? I think about that notion of living in the moment. Is that correct to think about that as a way of living? projections or intentions that we carry with us from moment to moment and cling to in terms of our desires and attachments?

[60:03]

Yeah, I think so. One aspect of working with karma is to make an effort to create positive karma. Positive karma is a tendency that carries over into the next moment. we want to do is be aware of the negative tendencies that we have and to try to substitute for those negative tendencies, positive tendencies, so that we will accumulate more wholesome mental states as we go along. But then the value of accumulating those wholesome mental us the possibility of realizing the nature of things, which kind of gets us beyond this kind of dichotomy. It gives us the possibility of living a life that's based on accurate perception and accurate action, so that we're off of the cycle of karma.

[61:13]

Fundamentally, the present is that, is having a wide enough mind so that karma comes and goes in a very wide field. It almost, in a sense, doesn't affect us. Because on the one hand, we can talk about having an understanding and a way of life that has nothing to do with karma, and yet on the other side, we are always subject to karma.

[62:17]

There's no beyond karma. Maybe leave it at that and do some chanting. When Diamond Matrix has said this, the Enlightened Being, Moon of Liberation, said to him, Are all the elements of Enlightenment fulfilled moment to moment only by Enlightened Beings in the seventh stage or in all ten stages?

[65:10]

Diamond Matrix said, All the elements of Enlightenment are fulfilled moment to moment by Enlightened Beings in all ten stages. Now, on the first stage of Enlightened Beings, the elements of enlightenment are fulfilled in Enlightened Beings, moment to moment, by focusing on the whole house. In the second, by removal of mental thoughts. In the third, by increasing commitment and attainment of the illumination of the Teaching. In the fourth, by engaging with the path. In the fifth, by going along with worldly occupations. by the establishment of all qualities of Buddhahood.

[66:12]

What is the use of this? All the elements of effort to evoke knowledge that are accomplished by enlightened beings in the first three to seven stages are accomplished without effort beginning in the eighth stage, and I want to know what I am doing. over the gap between these two worlds, except by the great power of higher knowledge. In the same way, it is hard to cross over the gap between abloyed and pure practice of the blind human beings, and it is impossible to do so enlightening, all enlightening beings practicing should be considered free from the plunge of supplications, due to the darkness of dedication to enlightenment, but because of being even with the path that it forwards to this station, up to the seventh stage, you cannot make all the practices which you have submitted as supplications.

[67:32]

It is like a king riding around an elephant, recognizing people with poverty without itself being affected thereby, and yet is not thus far totally gone beyond that human condition. Then, if he is born in the Brahman heaven, and having relinquished the human body and ascended to the Brahman palace, with little effort he looks around looking at the universe and shows the radiance of the Brahman, he then becomes what we all call human. In the same way, from the first stage he is a living being. but are not able to find them because of the impure blood they have. But thus far it cannot be said that they have completely gone beyond the ills of the human beings. And then, until the completely pure vehicle of enlightening beings, traveling around all worlds, they recognize the ills afflicting all worldly beings, but they are not affected by those ills, having only their simple worldly actions.

[68:44]

Yet the enlightening beings in the seventh stage have mostly transcended the matter, Why? Because they cannot act out any inflections. They cannot accept any inflected people. Because they have seen good and bad, they cannot act out any inflections. They cannot accept any without inflections. Enlightened beings in the seventh stage become endowed with physical, verbal, and mental actions at a superior extent. They can live beyond all of the forces of action that are prescribed upon them by the Enlightened, and continue to act in order to purge the chasms of conduct recognized by the Enlightened. Also, whatever worldly arts and crafts and businesses they do in the fifth stage, all who have no fear, whether in terms of will or practice.

[69:57]

All their meditations, concentrations, attainments, mystic knowledges and liberations become present to them in terms of cultivation, but not yet as a mature consciousness. Just as it is stated, the power of cultivation of wisdom and means in every thought in a certain stage of mind being entertained and mind being concentrated One called ascertainment of all means. One called ascertainment of the means of the things that they are. One called firmly established root. One called door of knowledge and mystic power. One called purification and adornment of the phenomenal realm.

[70:59]

One called praise and enlightenment and a concentration called door of existence. and by the power of great compassion, they go beyond the stages of whisperings and individual illuminates, and enter into the stage of contemplation with wisdom and knowledge. They are not the unlimited physical, vertical, and mental actions of aligning beings in the first stage, beyond the practice of listeners and individual aluminists.

[72:03]

The Document Matrix says they are, but that is because of the magnitude of their intense focus on the Buddha way, not by their own conscious contemplation. But in the seventh stage of aligning beings, came not to be defaulted by his own intellectual powers. But when he grows up he goes beyond the works of all the ministries because of his own intellectual power. In the same way, like he begins to sell all the streets to individual politics as soon as they are inspired because of the greatness of their determination, not because of self-contemplation by their own own experiential knowledge.

[73:11]

Just as the bad they are said to have an inconceivable physical, verbal, and mental action. It is remarkable how a naive being can survive in the ultimate reality without actually experiencing extinction. Just as the person with good knowledge of the characteristics When on board a ship, the ocean becomes familiar with the waves and the currents, and is unscathed by the ocean waters. In the same way, identity is the sense of age. Every entry into the ocean or foundation is a great vehicle on board that helps the ocean transcend the waves, abide in the sphere of ultimate reality. daily existence, while their minds are gone to nirvana.

[75:02]

They are also surrounded by a great company, yet they have a changing, lasting detachment of mind. They can undertake birth in the world by willpower for the sake of development of beings, but they are not stained by the evils of the world. They also become tranquil, extremely calm, and serene, yet by exceeding the means they burn with fire, however beating the burn by burning. They are born of the knowledge of Buddhists and have made the stage illustrious against individual wilderness. For although they come to reach the storehouse of the realm of the Buddha knowledge, yet they adhere to an attempt to overcome the demons. Though they have completely transgressed They appear to follow all worldly occupations, yet they attain the way to transcend the super-world. They get brighter and more enormous, as do those smaller creatures, human, celestial, or fabulous.

[76:09]

But they do not take their attention off the light and the way that they are enlightened. Too different from the beings of the seventh stage of fire-dwelling, many of the individuals become invisible, like a great individual in a little town. Many of them have disabilities. Many hundreds of thousands of millions, many hundreds of thousands of billions, many hundreds of thousands of trillions of Buddhists, have you seen those Buddhists in America? They dedicate to perfect enlightenment. They attend those whose teachings they put them to practice by means of the light of true attainment, with distance and knowledge, and protect them by accomplishing them, and they become observers of the teachings of the Buddhists.

[77:14]

Through roots of goodness, I would like to say that in this world today, you are a child of God. You [...] are a child of God. and immaculate, and cannot be outshone by illustrates and individual movements, just as the light of the sun cannot be outshone This is a summary exposition of the 7th Stage of Enlightenment.

[79:12]

of listeners and individual aluminists. We also like to feed the beings into certainty. Whatever acts they undertake, whether by giving them kind speech, or beneficial action, or cooperation, all of it is never apart from the vows of the Buddha, to teaching the community of enlightened beings, to the practice of enlightened beings, They undertake appropriate effort by two-century days to attain quadrillion constellations, see a quadrillion buddhas and recognize their power, shape the quadrillion worlds, go up to a quadrillion islands, bloom in a quadrillion worlds, develop a quadrillion beings to maturity, live for a quadrillion eons, penetrate a quadrillion eons,

[80:44]

beings. Beyond that, humanity and beings through the power of vows can, by the excellence of their vows, perform countless transformations of bodily or logistic powers, visions, fear of action, voice, conduct, adornment, empowerment, resolution, and performances. The Unbounded Matrix spoke these verses describing this stage. With profound knowledge following the trail of ultimate truth, coursing in the monotony of things as light, reflections, illusions, dreams.

[82:05]

Yet they show compassion and enter the seventh stage. They purify the mind, while their own minds, their consciousness, are without discriminatory thought. They are endowed with the marks of the Buddha, while unmovable in the essence of truth. They speak good and clear to the world, while not detached from sound. At any instant, enter the mind of knowledge of Buddha. entering a higher stage, striving to benefit the world. The moment of thought appearing in the virtues of the path, fulfilled the interest in this place.

[83:12]

The seeking of good for all beings is giving. Discipline is the cessation of afflictions. Tolerance is non-injury. Energy is the ever-greater fear in your existence. Interpretability of the path is the meditation of the virtuous. Assess the attainment of your qualities in the life of the next moment. established in the action of knowledge

[84:34]

Being on the path, they do not act on afflictions. They get filled with zeal for supreme knowledge, their affliction is not defended. They know the various orderly arts and crafts, the uses, medicines, and spells, and that their well-versed is grounded in all sciences. They attain meditation, mystic knowledge, and powers by cultivation. to the infinite practices of lightening beings, before, by determination, from now on, by are harder for the world to know. They serve millions of Buddhists, becoming more and fewer like the Golden Order.

[86:06]

Even more, though, is the natural security problem. We need to start this.

[88:10]

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