So here's the first couple of chapters of the Abhidharma-kosha-vasya, Vibhasubandhu. And so this is kind of a pre-Mahayana Abhidharma text. However, as I mentioned, I think that Vasubandha wrote this maybe after he studied some of his brother's teachings on Mahayana Abhidharma. It's somewhat adjusted to the later Abhidharma. But basically, this lot of early analysis is in here, and also the early analysis is also in the later Abhidharma, too. This isn't quite a Mahayana Abhidharma text. But it's very important to have a text. And what does... What does Vasudev Banda say when he says, what is avidharma?

[01:05]

What's his answer to this question? What is avidharma? What? Prajna. Close. Prajna. And it's following. Prajna and it's following. What's it's following? No, it's... Yeah, it's maybe the... It's the whatever elements of experience that are arising with that moment of the prajna, all the different elements of experience per time. And then he says, what is prajna? What is prajna? The answer to that is? Yeah, discernment of dharmas.

[02:06]

Or discernment of elements of experience. Or in some sense, in this context, it's elements of experience. that have been discerned in our experience. So it's actually the elements which are resulting from an analysis of your experience. And to discern these elements individually and in relationship to yoga, that's the content of prajna in the Gurdjieff Dharma. So we talked in the last couple of classes, we talked about elements of experience in terms of five heaps or five aggregates in which the elements of experience could be placed. Sanskrit is called five skandhas, pancha skandha, five aggregates.

[03:14]

And then also another analysis of experience is doors of arrival or doors of arising. Doors of arising of what? Consciousness. And then the The third main analysis was the Datus. The Datu means element or realm or sphere. And there's five aggregates, 12 sense doors or doors arising, and 18 elements. And

[04:20]

All conditioned dharmas can be placed in these five aggregates. All impure dharmas can be placed in these five aggregates. All dharmas can be placed in the 12 doors of sensation and the 18 elements. And then another analysis in this school, at the level of this taxisabhadana kosha, another analysis is to analyze experience in terms of seventy-five dharmas. Seventy-two dharmas of the seventy-five are conditioned dharmas. Three are unconditioned or unmade dharmas. So total of 75 is the more minute analysis of experience as presented in this text.

[05:24]

This text presents 75, 5, 12, and 18. It also presents other ones too. But actually quite a few other analysis are also performed in the nine chapters of this text. the relationship between the, you know, what do you call it, point-by-point correspondence between the elements as seen in the aggregates, the elements as seen in the doors of arrival, or at the eight elements, and also in terms of five groups. So the... Seventy-five dharmas are categorized in five groups which are not the same as the five aggregates. So here I have a chart which puts in correspondence the five groups in which the seventy-five elements are present.

[06:30]

Five aggregates, five skandhas, five ayatmas, the twelve ayatmas, so it's a chart here. which puts it in correspondence. You can study that and see if you understand how they go together. So here, I'm going to do from here. And then here I have a list of the 75 dharmas, the 75 dharmas as presented in the school. It says of the kusha, kusha school, the kushas, that means the way of saying kosha, kosha school. And then we have these 30 verses, but not everybody took them, and I'm just going to keep them a little longer because this is actually, these 30 verses are 30 verses which are coming out of the next faith talk.

[07:33]

So just as well that you didn't all take them. Thank you. Thank also while you're at it. So on Saturday, we're having a little sitting at one day.

[08:41]

At one day on Saturday, we're having a little sitting at Noah Bowden. Bernard said something about, he mentioned the word contemplation. He's like, you know, that there's kind of, in the word contemplation is the word template, in a way. So, con goes with template. Contemplation, and the con means, what is the con? The con means contemplation. Uh, the kan doesn't mean with, and it's kam, not kam, kam. Doesn't mean with, in this case, it means intensive. And, uh, and, uh, and then the, so it's kam together with tempum.

[09:44]

Yeah. But the root is kam. Oh, I see. root is com, which is intensive plus templum. Templum means an open space marked out for augury. The word temple comes from the same thing. It's a space set up for augury, for making divinations and predictions by looking at what's in the space. So contemplate means to observe carefully. And it's related to this root, which means the root T-E-M, the templum, which is a temple, a shrine, an open place for observation. But contemplate, in this case, is something we use and carve out a space.

[10:44]

And then we use the space for contemplation, and then comes to intensively observe the space. So we have experience, and then we put a template on the experience. We carve out some part of the experience, open part of it up to observe. The skandhas, the yagnas, and the dhatus are templates you put on your experience, and also you could stack them. So you put the skandhas on your experience, and it's a way of getting into it with your experience. You put the dhatus on, it's another way. It's a somewhat different way of being with them. You put the dhatus on, it's a somewhat different way of being with them. And then you put all three on and see the relationship. It's another way to be with your experience. The 75 on there is another way. And I mentioned the simple one to begin with.

[11:49]

Put the template of wholesome and unwholesome in transparency. And look to see if wholesome or unwholesome. Put the template with outflows or without outflows in transparency. Is there gaining here? Is it concerned with gain and loss? Is it concerned with gain and loss? Yes, no. Mostly yes, of course, but maybe once in a while, maybe not. So at that time, run to your teacher and say, I found a moment where there wasn't any gain after the victory. It was a moment, pure moment. There was no outflows. And the teacher, was there any incoming here? So that's a simple, what do you call it, bipolar analysis. In the, what do you call it, the Four Foundations of Mindfulness, you first have body, then you have feelings.

[12:55]

And so feelings is a template. You have teaching of feelings. You put the feeling template on your experience and then see, is it positive, negative, or neutral? It's a simple analysis. Relatively simple. It may be hard at first to sort of see, but, you know, If you're driving, driving a car is a good place to go to. Driving along. Maybe not feeling too good. Maybe it's kind of gray, gray day. Don't feel too good and suddenly, wham, you feel good. Wham, you feel bad. But you feel kind of bad. You feel kind of bad. Yeah, I think I feel kind of bad. You're carving out your experience and identifying that the way of experiencing your sensation is painful, painful, somewhat painful, somewhat painful, somewhat. And then, oh, actually, kind of not so painful. And I noticed. And then you started to get a feeling for looking at your experience through the template of the second stomp, first metastatic stomp.

[14:02]

And that's mindfulness of feelings, the second foundation of mindfulness. Third foundation of mindfulness is mindfulness of basically mental states. And under that heading, you could do the more simple analysis of wholesome impulse, or agitated, or concentrated, or not concentrated. Wholesome, without impulse, without impulse, those simpler ones. And then in the fourth foundation of mindfulness, There you'll find Vyaskandas and the 12 Ayats. They don't have the tattoos or the text. So the fourth one is, in these four foundations, the fourth one is the most subtle. The fourth one is the one you really want to develop. It's also the eightfold path and the... Four Noble Truths, they're also templates to put on your experience. Suffering, cause of suffering, cessation of suffering, except, but it's not that easy to find the cessation of suffering, as you may have noticed.

[15:15]

And again, the fourth truth is the Truth of the Path. The Truth of the Path is, put the template of the Truth of the Path on your experience and see if you can see your experience which is proposed at dharmas which have outflows, in such a way that there's no outflows. There's a way of seeing all the impure dharmas such that the total picture is not impure. The total picture has no gain and loss involved. Then you can see all four truths on top of your experience. Okay? And a little bit more on the skandhas, which I think is really a nice little thing in here, in the chapter, in the first chapter here. Actually, one little exercise. I think it's... Oh, yeah.

[16:16]

So, after they go through the skandhas, Vasubandhu says, all conditioned dharmas are included within the totality of the skandhas. And all impure dharmas are included within the totality of the upadana skandhas, skandhas of kli. And then all the dharmas are included within the totality of the ayatanas and the dhatus. But more briefly, all dharmas are included within one skanda, one ayatana, and one dhatu. So all dharmas are included within 12 ayatums, right? So if you look at the chart, you can maybe see how it is that all dharmas are included within 12 ayatums. All dharmas are included within 15 datus. So in the chart, you can see how all dharmas are included within 18 datus.

[17:19]

It'll take you a while to see it, but it's there. But then Vasudevanda summarizes it more simply within three things. set up 12 and 18 with three things, one skandha, one ayatana, one dhatu, you can include all dharmas. More briefly, what are those three? Rupa. Yeah, rupa skandha, that's right. Manayatana. And dhammadhatu. So if you look in the chart, you see, if you look at dhammadhatu, which is like the 18th element in the Dattus. You look at the Manayatana, which is the 12th. No, it's actually the 11th of the 12. It's stuff like that. Well, that's what it is. Oh, it's 12. Oh, it's 12.

[18:20]

Oh, it's 12. Is that what you said, the mano? I said, no, I said, I said... Oh, there's a mistake on here, sorry. Is this 12? 12. Oh, no, here it's 6. So it's 6 on... Manayatin. There's 6 on... That's the dhānti. So Rupa Skanda, number one under Skanda, which has these two sets of five, number six on the Ayatollah, and number 12 under the doctors, which of those three had a 12-aluminum-sized wound. Let's see what... If you look, for example, through the rupa, so the five indriya.

[19:34]

See where it says five indriya under the rupaskanda? So five indriya. Indriya means sovereign. That's related to Indra. It's sovereign in regards. The indriyas are the five centaurs. Five indriyas are the five centaurs. So they correspond to the five ayatanas. And then the five artyas are the five objects. They correspond to the seventh or eleventh of the ayatanas. And then the manayatana That's the other layout. And then dharmadhatu corresponds to the twelfth layout. He put us at one stand up and two at the same time. Mahayat and dharmayat. But he's one of each. But you see, mahayat is this. So the first skandha has all the five ayatumas.

[20:39]

The first skandha has all five? The first five ayatumas. It has the first five and it has seven through eleven. And seven through eleven, I see. It has the first five datus and it has seven through eleven. So the first skandha has ten elements in its ayat. That's corresponding to 10 iotus, 10 delta. So then the mono iotum corresponds actually to 6 delta. See that? Corresponds to mono dot 2, which is the mind's function, the mind's function. It also corresponds to 6 sense consciousness, which is 13 greater. So if you have rupascanda and you have six diaphanas, the six diaphanas doesn't just correspond to one doctor, it corresponds to seven doctors.

[21:43]

You see that? So one of the doctors corresponds to the mind organ, mind functioning as an organ, as opposed to the first group of organs. And then the Manayaptan also includes the six sense consciousnesses. So that's of course one of the seven consciousnesses. And then the Dharmayaptan, of course, one of the dharma doctors. And the dharma doctors are Veda Naskanda, Samyaskhanda, samskaraskhanda, and abhijanapti. And space, two kinds of your own. Samyaskhanda has, when it comes to skandhas, it has the vedanaskhanda, the deliaskhanda. It has the perception or perception skandha, samyaskhanda.

[22:48]

And it has what's called samskaras, which has all kinds of mental functions, like faith, like a faith, diligence, like a diligence, self-respect, like a self-respect, concern for how other people see you, like a that, concentration, attention, decision, mindfulness, any kind of mental factor that this 75 analysis, 75 Dharma analysis has. It's not included in in the other categories. Plus, also in the Dhammadattu are space. So, the Dhammadattu, the Dhammayatana, include everything. It's not including Rupa or his consciousness. The chart shows it. That's a good little exercise, isn't it?

[23:51]

To read that chart. If you understand that chart, you kind of sort of understand the relationship between the different things. Space and the two kinds of nirvana on here? Asamskrita. Asamskrita, with five amas. On the left-hand side, asamskrita. That's it. The asamskrita, akasha, akasha is space. So asamskrita is space, akasha. Nirvana, which comes from effort, and Vajisambha comes from nirvana. And nirvana, which comes without effort, which is natural nirvana quality. So those are the 300 addition values. They're unmade. They're existent phenomena, but they're not made phenomena. They're not compounded. And they have no gain or loss at all. and they belong to their reductant. They don't belong to the skandhas because the skandhas are all conditioned dharmas, all compounded dharmas, not all dharmas.

[24:59]

Yes? Back on the part where it talks about the following of prajna, and it says the following of prajna is escorting the five pure skandhas, which are called such prajna. Are they the five pure skandhas as opposed to the clinging skandhas? Right. The pure skandhas would be the same skandhas, which are... The skandhas include all made dharmas, but made dharmas are all impure, except... under the context, in the context of path. But in the path, I think somebody said that, the sweep that's the path accompanies prajna. So prajna lives in the same psychophysical field, except it lives in the field when the field's understood in terms of the truth of the past, no gain or loss in the field. So that's where, that's probably the suit.

[26:02]

So when the Ascandas are used as a template... No, you can use the Ascandas as a template and still see gain and loss in the theater. But then they're up and down the score. Then they're up and down the score. Because when you see gain or loss, then it's clean. Now if you see gain and loss, then it's actually clean. see that it loosened, then you don't fall for it, and then it jerks down. There's no loss then. And then another kind of nice summary statement that Batsubando makes. He makes a whole bunch of nice summary statements in here, but one of them he says, this is the Karaka 20 CD, he says, why did the Blessed One, the Buddha, give these skandhas, ayatanas and dhatus as the tribal designation of dharmas?

[27:08]

Why did he give these templates? And the answer is, the teaching of the skandhas, the ayatanas and the dhatus were given because of error, faculty and joy. That's the verse. Sanskrit. Okay, so error. Error is threefold. First category of error is persons who go astray considering the mental phenomena as together constituting a self. That's the first category of error. People who see mental phenomena as constituting a self. The second are similarly mistaken with respect to material elements. Let's see the material elements. Let's see a cell phone. The third are similarly with respect to both mental and material.

[28:11]

So for people who, I guess, don't have much problem to see, but maybe they don't so much see a self in the material, material elements like gross sense of body or more subtle sense of body as being the organs. and also a more subtle sense of form in terms of colors and so on, they don't see a self there. But when it comes to their feelings and their conceptions and their mental formations, consciousness, they see a self, they mistake it as a self. That's one mistake. And for them, which one of those templates puts the most emphasis on mental phenomena, gives the mental phenomena the biggest picture, biggest attention? Skanda. Skanda. Skanda. Yeah. Skanda is because the Skanda presentation is four-fifths, 80% is about mine, and one-fifth would be 20%.

[29:15]

One fit, bought, bought. So for those who see a self in mental phenomena, now you have this fourfold, you have this 80% of material to get them to look at the mental field more carefully, see if it's actually a self. For those who misconstrue material experience of the self, they give them the Say it louder. Iotanus. Iotanus. What? What's the reason for giving them the Iotanus? What? Yeah, the 1012s are about physicality, right? So the Iotanus are mostly presenting a refined analysis of the physicality, plus the other part of the analysis is very brief. So it's mostly emphasizing 1012s is emphasizing the template of looking at the physicalities.

[30:22]

Look at it one more carefully. Is there really a self there? So according to that. And then those who could use Bolt, they have 12, 6. Quite a bit of elaborate analysis of the physical and an elaborate analysis of the mental. So those are the people who see itself in these different contexts at these three different analysis. It turns out we have basically physical or material and mental, both body and mind, and there's not another category of our experience, as it turns out. So those three seem to take care of those who've got the problem with the mind, those who've got the problem with the body, those who've got the problem with both. And this doesn't have an analysis for one. It doesn't have a problem with either.

[31:23]

They don't need any help. And that's that. That covers air. Huh? That covers air. Yeah, right. There's two more. The next one is moral faculties. The faculty of speculative consciousness has three categories, sharp, medium, and dull. So the sharp... I'm sorry, it's embarrassing, but what are the three error... Error, faculty, and sphere of influence. Why aren't we talking about them again? Because Vasubandhu is asking... He asked you, how come Buddha gave these three categories? You didn't know before this, did you? So you kind of see why you get three, because people have this, people make a certain type of error. Those are the three basic types of error that people make of seeing self in these different experiential fields. So then he gives you these templates to put on these, gives you these three templates to put on the field of experience.

[32:29]

And the templates are... for people who have certain types of problems, make certain types of mistakes. Now, some people make all three types of mistakes. See, it means all three. But some people make one, three, two of three, and so on. So for those who make three of the three, you use three. For those who use two, you use two. And for those who make one, you use one. But even for one, oh. only makes one, it's probably good to do the other ones too, just because it refines your awareness and your confidence in that the self cannot be found in any of these patterns. That's the air side. The other side is, in terms of faculties, the skandhas for the sharp faculty, the iotanas for the medium, and for the dull is the dhatus. Vasubandha's favorite is the dhatus. The next one is... And also, another way to put it is... The next one is... Why is that?

[33:39]

Why? Why is it for Sharpto? Is it like skandhas are... It's more complicated, more difficult to understand? It's more difficult to understand, but also the error is a little bit more subtle. To see the self in the mind is more subtle than to see a self in a body. You said moral. It's moral. He did say moral, but then he said, you know, I don't know. It also says faculty of speculative consciousness. Actually, this faculty is the prajna joints of the prajna. It is, yes, the prajna faculty. The prajna faculty of the people is the sharp medium adult, the sharpest for the skandhas. The teaching of the skandhas addresses itself to the first category, those whose mistakes are with respect to the mental phenomena, who are sharp faculties and who are fond of brief teachings. The teaching of the iotanas addresses itself to the second category, those who make the mistake of the material and who like a medium level of, you know, a medium level of analysis, a little bit more analysis than the five, say, twelve, and they're...

[35:10]

dull people like the more elaborate ones. You know, it gives them more places to get a hold of it. So that's the reason that Vasubandha gave. The next one is, he also says, basically, how come... Well, he just tells you that... Here it says sensation, but we say feeling or... Experience. Feeling or experience. Chinese character that they use to translate this skanda means to receive or experience. Feeling, experience, all sensation. So you have a sensation. How do you experience it? How do you feel about it? Or you feel it's painful, you feel it's pleasurable, you feel it's true. It's the way you experience sensation. That skandha, the second skandha, and the third skandha of conception, each constitute a separate skandha. How come they get a separate skandha? Because the next skandha has all kinds of important mental factors in it, but they don't get to be a skandha.

[36:14]

I mean, not one of them gets to be a skanda. Even the vijnana skanda, there's lots of different kinds of consciousness, and they're all put into the consciousness skanda. And there's 64 elements in the fourth skanda. How come these two get to be a skanda all by themselves? That's the question. The answer is the two mental states... feeling or experience and ideas are defined as distinct skandhas because, number one, they are causes of the roots of dispute, they are causes of transmigration, and they are the reason of the cause which justify the order of the skandhas. So they're the roots of dispute, these two. Attachment to pleasure and attachment to opinions.

[37:21]

Sensation and idea, so attachment to pleasure and attachment to opinions. These two are extremely important in being the source of battle. Another translation, by the way, is battle. Discord, disharmony. So it's because they're so important in causing trouble that they get to be responded unto themselves. Also, sensation and eye ideas respectfully, respectively, it says actually respectfully, sensation and eyes are, respectfully, the principal causes of those two roots of attachment to opinions and attachment to pleasure. The Buddha says, you know, All sentient beings fully possess the wisdom and virtues of the Buddhas, but because of attachment and false opinions, they don't realize it.

[38:23]

So these two get to be scandalous under themselves because they're so important. They have big roots of trouble. In fact, if one becomes attached to pleasure, it is because one relishes sensations. If one becomes attached to opinions, it is by reason of erroneous or false ideas. If you don't become attached to opinions, unless they're false, false opinions are the kind of opinions you can get attached to. The correct opinion is self-destruct. Of course, the correct opinion is emptiness. My opinion? Empty. Okay, that's the first category. The next one is sensation and ideas are causes for transmigration in samsara. Those who are greedy but for sensation and those whose ideas are erroneous transmigrate.

[39:30]

And then the last reason is that They're given separate skandhas because these two are pivotal in justifying the order of the skandhas. And so then the next verse says, We have defined the skandhas. We should now explain the order in which the skandhas are enumerated. The order of the skandhas is justified by their grossness, their defilement, their characteristics of a jug, etc., and also from the point of view of their sphere of influence. You will soon see. I mean, you'll soon hear. Perhaps you'll see. Okay, for grossness, the skandhas are in the order they are because material is most gross. Healings among the mental skandhas are the grossest, the easiest to spot. You see, that feels like the easiest to spot.

[40:45]

Oh, that's painful. That hurts my feelings. That's pleasure. I'm not sure how I feel about that. Still, it's quite a feat. I remember one time when my daughter was quite young, she went to the planetarium at Golden Gate Park, and she was looking at the, you know, I don't know what they do, but anyway, they open the sky up, right, and the kids are looking out there. When she saw that, she said, I had this warm feeling in my heart here. Oh, warm. Good. So at that young age, she could spot and articulate a positive sensation. Children do, of course, feel it, but they can't necessarily identify it. I feel good. I feel bad. But when they start doing this, they're actually able to see that's kind of it. So it's pretty gross. And then when she was quite a bit older, you know the story about where one of her friends stayed overnight and they were really getting along very nicely, had a wonderful visit.

[41:55]

And then the next morning when her friend's mother came to pick her up, when her mother came into the house, the girl ran and jumped on her mother's lap And then they left. And after they left, my daughter said, she did that just to make me feel bad. And then, you know, an hour or so later, she's sitting on my lap and my wife said, are you doing that just to make me feel bad? She said, okay, I'll give her another chance. I'll watch her at school tomorrow. Since she came home from school, I said, how did it go? And she said, I saw that I got angry at her for what I was thinking about her. So as you can see, actually, the second, the third, the third Volascandas.

[42:58]

The anger goes in the fourth scanda. You can see the anger. You can see that she has some view of her friend. She was thinking her friend was a blah-blah, whatever. This image of her friend. So she was actually able to articulate Volascandas. So... But they're more subtle. It's more subtle than that. The feel of pain is important to know. It's very powerful for transmigration. And the images we have of things are also very powerful for transmigration. And opinions or images are very powerful. But feelings are more gross, most gross and mental. Images are next most gross, are next most subtle. Emotions like anger and confusion and so on are more subtle. And the most subtle is consciousness itself, which is clear awareness, clear knowing. That's the most subtle. So that's why I think in that order, the order is justified by increasing subtlety, decreasing grossness.

[44:02]

That's one justification of the order. Yes? Good question. Transmigration means how we move from one kind of state of being to another, how we evolve positively or negatively, the ups and downs of our states, and even the forms of rebirth or transmigration. Mind states, all of them. Where are mind states? Well, if you're doing the four foundations of mindfulness, the third foundation of mindfulness is mind states, or states of consciousness. But those tend to be a little grosser. But the fourth foundation of mindfulness is where you're looking at the five aggregates. In the five aggregates, you're no longer characterizing whole mind states. You're actually doing a finer analysis of your mind state.

[45:04]

So you have consciousness which is determined by what arises with it. Because consciousness is just, you know, really clear. Consciousness doesn't have the color of wholesome or unwholesome or painful or pleasurable. It's clear. But it arises with material and mental events. Like, for example, it arises with a painful feeling. So the state of consciousness with a negative sensation is a state of painful sensation, or a state of a subject of ideas. So it meant the second, third, and fourth aggregates that arise with consciousness condition the quality of the state of consciousness. Does that make sense in terms of aggregates? Yeah.

[46:06]

But in terms of how this process transmigrates or gets hooked into a cyclic pattern that you can't get out of, the first two skandhas are more powerful in terms of transmigration than the later one. The later ones are more powerful in terms of getting you free from some transmigration. There's subtle dharmas in the fourth act of good that team up with consciousness to counteract the patterns which have been set up by the grosser mental phenomena, images and feelings. And then the next category is their defilements. So in the course of external transmigration, men and women are mutually infatuated by their bodies because they are attached to the pleasures of sensation. Their attachment proceeds from erroneous ideas which are due to defilements which are the samskaras.

[47:13]

And the mind, which is defiled by the defilements, the samandhas are thus arranged according to the process of defilement. So, That might have been hard to follow, but anyway. Because of the pleasures of sensation and the erroneous images that proceed in this way, transmigrate. And the next one is the example of matter is the pot, sensation is the food, ideas are the seasoning, the samskaras are the cook, and mind is the consumer. That seems a little what? But the point here is that in this thing, mind is the container, and that the food or the nourishment and the flavor is the first two mental structures. The actual food and flavor.

[48:17]

The way it's cooked goes with all these other complex mental factors, but the actual substance the dish, which is the seasoning. The seasoning is the ideas and the food itself is the feeling and flavor. Seasoning is the actual physical, in some sense, physical seasoning. The first discount is when you cook is all the other aggregates, I mean, all the other mental factors except for consciousness, which is the thing that knows this. But what does it know? It knows all these mental factors which arise with it. The two most important are the first two. And the sphere of influence is that in this world where we have bodies, you know, men and women and so on, and dogs and cows and stuff, in this realm, the dominant skanda, in a way, is the rupaskanda.

[49:23]

It's the boss of this realm. And then, in this realm, the realm of life, where we eat bowls of soup, cars, wheels, Rupa is the dominant one. Then in the next realm, which is called the fine material realm, there you don't have bodies in the sense of life. male and female bodies and arms and legs and catalepsy. There you have more subtle materiality. And there, the feeling is a big one. There, the feeling is, there's no negative feeling. And there's some neutral feeling, but mostly it's positive feeling. And there, the feeling is dominant or scomped. Then as you move into the realm called formless realm, where there's no colors, or smells, or tastes, or touch, or bodies, or anything in that realm, you're mostly meditating on images.

[50:33]

And the images are like the image of the infinity of space, the infinity of consciousness, and so on. These meditation topics in the formless realm, in that realm, The third skandha is dominant. The highest part of that realm, the fourth skandha is dominant. And finally, the result of this whole process is a conscious process, the fifth skandha. So in terms of the sphere of influence, the order. So this is another new kind of picture of how the skandhas are organized, as delivered to you by Vasubandhir. And then we come to, just to say that there's more to come of this type of analysis, but we don't have to do it all before we take this next big step. After we take this next big step and recover from it, we can go back and get better at this analytical work of mind, body, mind.

[51:44]

The next step is that this is all well and good and one can attain liberation, personal liberation, by this type of study. And this type of study will be resuscitated later. But the next step is a step that comes with not being concerned with personal liberation, but being concerned with the liberation of all beings. And there, another approach, another way of practice is being proposed. And that way of practice is a way of giving up or taking away all these templates. So you use these templates to observe your experience.

[52:48]

You become more intimate with it. By becoming more intimate with it, you can find out if there actually is some kind of like independently existing anything in this field. There's a self in your physical experience. There's a self in your mental experience. There's a self in the... You can actually get in there and find out by using these templates, observing these templates. You can verify that it's not there. You can obtain personal liberation. People did. But the Mahayana requires that we take away all templates. So then the next step is typified by the Heart Sutra. It says, Avalokiteshvara was practicing prajnaparamita and saw that the aggregates he's been talking about are empty in the inherent existence.

[53:57]

So that all five skandhas, all five aggregates, were empty. And thus we leave all suffering and distress. Not just his own, but everybody's. By this vision. This vision liberates all beings. And then he goes through and says, in the context of realizing emptiness, then all these abhidharma analyses are not found. There is no There is no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind, no comfort, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch, no object of mind, no realm of the mind consciousness, and so on. There's no 12 links of causation. There's no fourth level truth. All these analyses that Buddha gave and that the Abhidharma put forth and Buddha gave these five skandhas and did all this further explanation for you how to work with them and refine them even more.

[54:59]

The ultimate vision of the bodhisattva, you can't find in this. And this is the second turn here. Take the templates away. Take the temple away. Take the Zen center away. Take away the people that you're devoted to saving. To realize that there's no beings to save. Actor. you committed to save them. And after you find no self in them, then find that there's no beings even to save. This is the second term. This is the beginning. This is the Mahayana. This is not Mahayana avidharma. This is the Mahayana deconstruction of avidharma. This is the Mahayana taking away the conceptual analysis which the Buddha taught first. And I mentioned... What time is it now?

[56:06]

Like 8... Is it 8.35? Huh? 8.30. Yeah. Well, I thought it was... I thought that... It's a shadow. I thought it was a shadow. I thought it was only 10 minutes ago. So anyway... He had this template, which was a very successful thing that the Buddha gave to the disciples, and they used it, and they attained freedom. Then he also gave a teaching to say, okay, now hand over the template. Where they used the raft to cross the ocean of suffering, they get to their side, and he said, now let go of the raft. You can give the raft to other people who need it to get across, but now I want you to like practice without the raft and find out that there's another way of practice which isn't you doing it by yourself, but the way you're practicing together with everyone.

[57:11]

So keep instructing the raft and realize it in a way without any mediation. And on Saturday I suggested three stories how these second wheel, second turn types of teachings would be made. One way is that the Buddha gave these teachings and only some people heard them. Another way is that he gave these teachings to some people and not to all people. He looked at some of the disciples and he thought, if I give these teachings to these people, and I tell them to take away the template, for example, take away the template of, is your state of mind wholesome or unwholesome? If I take that away before they're actually committed to practicing wholesome conduct, and before they can identify wholesome or not wholesome, if I take that away before they can do that, they may not be able to continue to practice wholesomely.

[58:18]

They must be able to continue to practice wholesomely while taking away any template about what wholesomeness is. But if I take away the template of what's wholesome, and then they don't practice wholesomeness, they won't really be practicing anything at all but unwholesomeness, and they won't even know it. Now, really, they won't be practicing unwholesomeness, but it'll look like they are, and they'll be very bad, painful. And when they realize how bad it is to be unwholesome and how good it is to be wholesome, And they're really committed to being wholesome and avoiding unwholesome. Then I can teach them analysis, and then I can take the analysis away. And I'll watch carefully and continue to be wholesome, even when they don't even know what wholesome is anymore. And they can continue to practice without any idea of what wholesome is, or to realize that wholesome is empty of any idea of wholesome. Wholesome is also empty of any idea of unwholesome.

[59:22]

And unwholesome is empty of any idea of wholesome and unwholesome too. But you can't be totally devoted to wholesome when you hear such talk. You shouldn't hear such talk. And when he noticed, when he started talking that way to some people, and they started to get kind of slack in their devotion to wholesomeness, he stopped talking that way. He said, you should practice wholesomeness without delay. And I'm watching carefully. Show me wholesomeness. Please, show me wholesomeness. Be wholesome. And they forgot about the teaching of activities. Just practice wholesomeness. But some people were able to hear this teaching and continue their devotion to the precepts. And he told those people, he said, don't tell anybody about this unless there are people who can continue to practice intense devotion to precepts while they realize that precepts are empty of inherent existence.

[60:25]

Don't tell anybody this. You can't continue the precepts under this teaching. And then they said, well, there aren't very many like that. Awesome. I said, I don't know. It's going to be a small group for a while. So for about 300, 400, 500 years, not too many people could hear this teaching. There's enough commitment to the precepts in the world now, so we can put that up. They got the idea that Buddhism is really committed to ethics. That's well established. We've got this huge Sangha. We've had several scandals, to make it clear. We've reiterated and been more specific about what we mean by these precepts. We've discovered that people get way off track, and we've made rules about those things. Now everybody's got the word. Now we can bring this Mahayana out." They brought it out. Another story is that the teachings were actually written down and hidden for quite a while with the Nagas.

[61:28]

The Nagas brought them out after about five hundred years. And another story is that after the Buddha died, people couldn't actually see the Buddha as a person anymore face to face in this world. But the Buddha and his successors, who were good yogis, could enter into states of concentration and meet Buddhas who lived in other worlds. The historical Buddha in our world was able to communicate with other Buddhas who lived at the same time as he did. They weren't living in India, they were living in other Buddha lands, and he had correspondence with them in his meditation. But very few of his human disciples were doing this because they had the Buddha to talk to. There were bodhisattvas who were co-existent with Buddha in history, and they were communicating with these other Buddhas.

[62:35]

After the Buddha died, these disciples of Buddha, these bodhisattvas, and people that they were teaching, they entered into states of meditation and met Buddhas who do not live in this world system, but who are living in other world systems right now, or right then. And they received these Mahayana teachings from those Buddhas at that time. And then they wrote them down and would have been appearing in the world approximately 400 to 500 years after Buddha died. And then they continued to appear for about 400 more years of these transmissions from bodhisattvas and Buddhas to human beings in this world. And they took down Mahayana sutras and also Mahayana treatises, and they're dictated by bodhisattvas. So there's different stories about where the mosque, where these Mahayana teachings came from, which were basically

[63:36]

in accord with the early teachings of the Buddha said, which is basically, after using the rafts, give them up. But, you know, he was only around for 80 years, so he couldn't keep taking the rafts away after he left. And people do not like to give up their rafts when they work. So they needed help giving up their rafts. Come through and read it to everybody. All you people who realize how good the Raps is, hand your Raps in. And that's what the Heart Sutra is about. Hand your Raps in. You people who know how to practice with these skandhas, practice with these ayat, practice with the Four Noble Truths, practice with the Twelve Full Chain of Causation. You people, hand them over. You've used them long enough. Now, open to the Ayat. open to practicing without templates. These templates were given by Buddha not to be held on to. They're just ways to get intimate with your life. You're not supposed to attach to the template.

[64:43]

I sometimes use the example of... And this can be used for the early teachings or the later teachings, too. We go out into a field, right? Let's just say it's like a field, you know, I don't know what, an acre? And let's say it's got grass growing. We're standing there, and I say, get intimate with the field. Now some people will just like stand there and get intimate with it, flat out. Other people will say, what's he talking about? How are we going to get intimate? Let's go to a movie. or you know do you like me other than get intimate with the field so what you do is you you put a little you make a little golf course a minute this is a this is a miniature golf course this is a small thing a miniature golf course where people can like you know

[65:48]

hit a ball from here to there and it goes over a bridge and you have to avoid two little puddles and it goes up and swirls around and goes like that and then people watch the ball and they watch the ground and they see the bridge and they see the dirt and they see the sand and they see the water and they see the little castle and they see the other guy's balls and they see all the stuff, right? And by putting this little golf course on top of the grass, people get intimate with the field. You know? And they learn that, you know, it's kind of like, and they sort of say, well, let's agree to follow the course of the miniature golf course. But they also see, well, actually, you don't have to, you can cross over. It's like an array of golf courses. You don't have to go down the fairway. You can actually just walk over to another thing and watch out so you don't get hit by the gun. You can go hang out in the rough. You can go back to the clubhouse. You can talk to a lot of possibilities. You just take away all the sand drafts, all the ponds, all the greens, all the flags, all the balls, all the clubs, all the caddies.

[66:55]

Will people actually study the field? Well, most people won't. Even if you tell them to, they will not actually study. But you build this thing and they're like, they're really washing it. Where does that go? How many strokes have I done? What's your score? And they have a really nice time because they're like actually communing with nature. People will not go out in the woods, you know. And, like, actually pay attention unless you give them a gun or a club and balls. Then they, like, pay attention to the ground and they pay attention to, like, where are the deer. And they feel good because they're actually out there with the deer and with the trees and they're actually somewhat aware of each other because the other people are armed. You know, so actually with this equipment, they feel good because they're getting in touch with their life, right?

[68:01]

But when you actually get there and you actually get in touch, then you can put down the guns and put down the clubs and put down everything and just be there immediately with what's happening. Mahayana says, you've had enough. Hand in your clubs. Hand in your templates. Give me back the greens. Just be there. You don't need this. You're actually... You're already home. You don't need anything. So it's... In that way, it's like the people who have clubs and the people who don't aren't different. Because the people who have clubs have given them up. So they're just the same as people who never heard of the clubs. Except that they have some realization. And so they can invite other people. And they might even give clubs to the other people to get them into paying attention to where they are. But they might not. They might find some people and say... come into the earth right here. Some people do it like that. Just like the sixth ancestor. We do not know how many lifetimes he spent studying the Abhidharma.

[69:05]

But when he was walking through a marketplace in Guangzhou, he heard some guy say, a Bodhisattva should produce a mind which has no abode. And he did. That's all he needed to hear. It was like, okay, I'm here. That's it. He didn't need any analysis of his experience. He immediately just realized what it's like to be here as a human being, being Guangzhou. So this is the second turning. And this second turning, giving up all the templates, is the basis of the third turning. We pick up templates again. But it will be different the second time. But based on understanding more deeply, this is all just a setup. And we know before we start, we're going to take this whole thing away. This whole thing is going to be taken away.

[70:06]

So it's already been taken away. Put it out there to see if we can put it out there without holding on to it. So that will be part of the difference between the next wave of teachings. Can you share your hand right now? I guess I was going to refer to compassion and lack of compassion. Yes. You know, I'm not very good at this literature, but we were just talking about how people are here. But just the whole teaching sounds very cold. Yeah. And this last Saturday I received some teaching from a psychologist, and what he evinces is basic loving kindness and compassion. Yes. So is that the next wheel that we're going to talk about?

[71:12]

The first wheel is Buddha's loving kindness and Buddha's compassion. The first? The first wheel. This is what the Buddha taught to people who came to him to receive the teachings. He taught these kinds of teachings. The first teachings he taught were wisdom teachings. But he taught these teachings to people who were already highly developed yogis. But later he taught loving kindness to people who were not highly developed yogis. For people that are not able to discipline themselves and be patient and kind to themselves and others. He taught them loving kindness. And by practicing loving kindness they became calm And when he became column, he then taught those people wisdom teachings.

[72:23]

Wisdom teachings are for those who are already well-established in working kindness. You looked at him and sensed... Well, I'm trying to fit the emptiness teachings That's where that is. Emptiness teachings are for people who are well established in loving-kindness. Oh, really? Yeah. You wouldn't want to give emptiness teaching to somebody who wasn't really deeply immersed in loving-kindness, because if you tell them that loving-kindness lacks inherent existence, they might say, well, if it lacks inherent existence, It doesn't matter much, I guess. Why should I practice something that locks me down in existence? But if you're already practicing with your whole spirit, and you're already totally devoted to it, it may be that you could hear that it's empty and continue to be totally devoted to it.

[73:37]

So if you could continue to practice loving kindness, even if you hear that all dharmas are empty, then you can receive the teaching, all dharmas are empty. But if you're not committed to loving-kindness, you're not ready, really, to hear the teaching that all dharmas are empty. Because just hearing that teaching without commitment to compassion is not appropriate. Teaching of emptiness is for bodhisattvas. It's not for people who are not committed to the welfare of others. Before you hear the teaching of emptiness, you already have to be committed to the welfare of others very deeply. And again, as I said, if you start hearing these teachings and you start to think it's not so important to be practicing love and kindness and compassion, if you think that's more important when you hear these teachings, then the teacher should say, we're going to take a break from these teachings for a while. We need to go back now and emphasize the importance of love and kindness.

[74:38]

And then when you feel well established there, then you're ready for these teachings. These teachings are for those who are already good at loving kindness, and good at compassion, and good at equanimity, and already do really appreciate when other people are doing well. They're very happy to see other people doing well. These people are people who are ready to receive these teachings. And I said at the beginning of the class, very quickly, I said, I need you to be doing those practices. The background of this, didn't I? Remember me saying that? Yes. I think I said it pretty fast. But at the beginning, it's probably on tape. You said it. But I'm saying, you know, like Linda Roos had a class on compassion on Tuesday night. Right? So that's that class. This is a class on wisdom. But the Bodhisattva's wisdom, the Mahayana wisdom of the Adhidharma, is for people who are primarily concerned to achieve Buddhahood for the welfare of others.

[75:44]

That's their main thing. And they're practicing, they're committed to practice love and kindness as a basis for these wisdom teachings. We want to realize an emptiness that has compassion in its core. First of all, you have to have compassion in your heart and then develop emptiness. The emptiness purifies our compassion. But you have to have compassion first, then. You don't get compassion by practicing emptiness initially. You get compassion by meditating on suffering and thinking about how you can help people, how good it is for other people to be happy, for you to be happy. It's basic practices. But the root is wisdom practices. So, again, I need you to be doing that, otherwise this class is losing its roots. This class is to clean your roots.

[76:45]

Pardon? When we go, we say, does that know or are we practicing? Yeah, yes. Yes, definitely. It is not like just emptiness. Yes. concentration or something. When you go to the Zen Do, the practice is awesome. You should go there with the understanding that you're going there to help all the people in the room with their practice. You're going there to support and inspire them to practice, which you do. But you need to be clued into that by reminding yourself that you're not going in there just for one person. You're going in there to help the whole group. The practice period in all beings, that's why you're sitting there. You're sitting there for the welfare of all beings. Yes, that's the way we think when we go into Zen. We go into Zen to help everybody in the Zen group, everybody throughout the universe. With thoughts of loving-kindness, compassion, and so on.

[77:48]

Yes, yes. That's the root of our practice. Okay? And then, it's okay. Just notice five scoundrels empties there. No problem. Yes. You said in the book that Christians are those who are committed to compassion and loving kindness, and that these Christians are people who are good at compassion and loving kindness. At least in my own life, I see a difference between those two things. Between being committed and skillful? Yes. Yeah. There is a difference. Well, the first thing that comes to my mind is that commitment is more important than the skill. Some people are, you know, like tonight or something, they're very skillful and kind, which is great, but they're not committed to it. We just happen to be in a good mood, which is wonderful, which is really wonderful.

[78:55]

But some people who are having some trouble being compassionate and having loving kindness tonight, they're committed to it. They're not yet skillful enough. Commitment is more important than actually being able to do what you're committed to. Now, the commitment will eventually realize what you're committed to. But if you're doing what you're committed to without commitment, you may do it, but then you may not do it tomorrow. And when you don't do it, you won't feel bad because you never... I didn't say I was going to be kind, you know, so there's no problem. But if I really commit to being kind, then when I'm not, I have a big problem with that. I really feel bad if I say I'm going to be kind to everybody and then I'm not kind to somebody. Because I committed to being kind to everybody. So the commitment is more important. than, in fact, a given moment of being kind. The commitment will come to fruit as great compassion, as great loving-kindness, as great effort and so on.

[79:56]

It will come to fruit that way. But just to be skillful won't necessarily come to fruit as great compassion. That would be something which is wonderful. It's truly wonderful. But more wonderful is the commitment. putting yourself on the line, like, I'm not just going to practice loving kindness with this person, but I'm going to practice loving kindness with everybody, and not just today, but tomorrow too. I'm committing to that. It doesn't mean I'm going to, but I'm committing to it so that when I don't, I'm going to feel bad. Because this is really what I want to do. So I need you to commit to this practice, And then if you commit, you're going to then struggle with that Buddha indefinitely until you attain Buddha. That's the way it goes, as far as I've seen or heard. The first thing is a commitment. So if you make that commitment and then you're also following through on it, of course it's slightly better to make the commitment and follow through than to make the commitment and not follow through.

[81:04]

But to make the commitment and not follow through, then it's... Sometimes I don't know if it's better to make the commitment and follow through or make the commitment and not follow through and feel bad. I don't know, but that's pretty good. Some wonderful practitioners feel pretty bad about how bad they are at what they commit to. Like a diorama. You see, it doesn't feel not too good about his practice. But that's because he made this great commitment. Bodhisattvas do not go around saying, we bodhisattvas never slip up on our commitments. They don't say that. They say, we bodhisattvas admit when we slip up on our commitments. That's what protects all beings, is that we admit and repent when we slip up on our commitments. That's what we do. That's an anthropological statement. It's not anthropological that we never make mistakes.

[82:09]

So we're at the stage now, turning the wheel, and we've just opened the door, taking away the rug of the Agadharma, which we have just tentatively got down for you, to get you to get the picture, and now we're going to move on to put it down again. but it's going to be always in danger of being taken away. So now I think maybe next class we can start looking at pretty much the same stuff, but in the context of Mahayana, which is great compassion and emptiness. Great compassion and give me your meditation practices. Check them at the door. Give us the rat. If you don't have a raft, I'll take it away. If you do have a raft, I'll give you a raft. Thank you for your loving kindness.

[83:27]

It was exuding very nicely. In our intentions. equally extends to every king and place, with a true, accurate, probable, and doubtless way to be. Beings are numberless.

[83:56]

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