We are going through this text of Nagarjuna, the letter that he wrote to his friend the king in South India. In it, he outlines the main points of the path to liberation and enlightenment. We saw that the text can be outlined in many different ways. First, the discussion deals with the general, fundamental background points, the essential points. Then, it goes into the main discussion, which deals with the six far-reaching attitudes, or the six perfections: far-reaching generosity, far-reaching ethical discipline, far-reaching patience, far-reaching joyful perseverance, far-reaching mental stability, or constancy of mind, and far-reaching discriminating awareness, or wisdom.
Far-reaching discriminating awareness is presented in terms of the three higher trainings: the training in higher ethical discipline, higher concentration, and higher discriminating awareness. In the training of higher discriminating awareness, there is a discussion of how to extract ourselves from the disturbing emotions. That’s the first point. The second is how to set out toward enlightenment. We are in the discussion of how to set out toward enlightenment. Here, we had having confidence in liberation, the result, which is a very important point. In order to strive for liberation and enlightenment, it is necessary not only to understand what they actually mean but also to have confidence that it is possible to actually achieve them – and not just theoretically; we need to have confidence that we ourselves are able to achieve them. Then we can put our hearts into working toward those goals.
Then, we had practicing the true pathway minds as the cause. Pathway minds refer to the fourth noble truth, the true pathway minds that are the levels of mind that we need to develop in order to attain liberation and enlightenment. These are the levels of mind that have non-conceptual cognition of the sixteen aspects of the four noble truths in general and, also, from a Hinayana point of view, non-conceptual cognition of the voidness of the person who realizes these sixteen and, in addition, from a Mahayana point of view, non-conceptual cognition of the voidness of each of the sixteen themselves.
With the type of mind that focuses on these points and their voidness, we, first, get rid of the doctrinally based disturbing emotions and, then, the automatically arising disturbing emotions. If we do this just with the renunciation of samsara, the determination to be free of it – so, our goal being liberation for ourselves alone – we just get rid of these two levels of emotional obscurations. If, in addition to renunciation, we do this with a bodhichitta motivation, our understanding of the voidness of all these factors will enable us to get rid of not only the emotional obscurations but also the cognitive ones that prevent our enlightenment.
We have two true pathway minds: the seeing pathway mind (commonly called the “path of seeing“) and the accustoming pathway mind. We are in the discussion of the seeing pathway mind with which we first get non-conceptual cognition of the sixteen aspects of the four noble truths. Concerning those four, as you recall, we speak about the true suffering, the true origins, or causes, of that suffering, the true stopping of that suffering and its causes, and the true pathway minds that will bring that stopping about. So, we need to understand the antidote to these obscurations, these obstacles preventing our liberation. For this, we need to understand the twelve links of dependent arising. That’s where we are.
The twelve links of dependent arising describe how samsara dependently arises based on a chain of factors. It also describes what we have to stop if we want to end, or stop, this chain and the order in which we’d have to stop it. The various aspects or links of this chain would need to be stopped in order to gain true stoppings.
We are up to Verses 109, 110 and 111. I’ll read them again.
[109] From unawareness, karmic impulses come forth; from them, consciousness; from that, name and form; from them, the cognitive stimulators are caused; and from them, contacting awareness, the Able Sage has declared.
[110] From contacting awareness, feelings (of a level of happiness) originate; on the basis of feelings, craving comes to arise; from craving, an obtainer emotion or attitude comes to develop; from that, an impulse for further existence; and from an impulse for further existence, rebirth.
[111] When rebirth has occurred, then an extremely great mass of sufferings will have arisen, such as sorrow, sickness, aging, deprivation of what we desire, and fear of death; but, by stopping rebirth, all of these (sufferings) will have been stopped.
Review of Doctrinally Based and Automatically Arising Unawareness of How Persons Exist
Here we have the presentation of the twelve links of dependent arising. Last time, we started the discussion of the first of these links, unawareness. We saw that unawareness is specifically the unawareness regarding how persons exist, both ourselves and others. So, it doesn’t include the unawareness of how phenomena exists. Concerning the unawareness of how we exist and how all other persons, all other sentient beings or limited beings, exist, there is both a doctrinally based unawareness and an automatically arising unawareness. Unawareness, we saw, is either just not knowing how we exist or having an incorrect understanding, more specifically, an inverted understanding, one that is the opposite of the way that we actually exist.
The doctrinally based one, we saw, refers specifically to the beliefs of an atman, a soul, that is asserted by the various non-Buddhist Indian schools of philosophy. There are three main characteristics of such a soul with which we might identify and think, “That’s really me.” This is a soul, or person, that is not just eternal (Buddhism says the conventional “me” is eternal with no beginning and no end) but is also unaffected by anything: it is static, always remains the same. Secondly, it has no parts; it is a partless monad, either the size of the universe or a tiny spark of life. Thirdly, it is an entity that can exist separately from the aggregates (body and a mind). Such a soul, such an atman, we would imagine comes to live inside a body and mind, makes use of it, and controls it as its possession. This is the false view of the soul that we’re talking about here. We went into quite a lengthy discussion of that. No need to repeat it.
We likewise looked at the automatically arising form of this unawareness. The automatically arising form of this is to feel that we are a self-sufficiently knowable person, or entity. This automatically arises; nobody has to teach us that. We feel that we could know ourselves just by ourselves. We want other people to, for example, “Love me just for me, for me alone – not for my body, not for my mind, not for possessions, and so on” – as if we existed as an object that could be loved all by itself. We also went into a lengthy discussion of that. There is no need to repeat that. So, we have these doctrinally based and automatically arising forms of unawareness. Based on them, we get all sorts of disturbing emotions.
Incorrect Consideration – Doctrinally Based and Automatically Arising
There was an interesting point that we brought up. I still haven’t gotten the answer to that; we’ll have to wait until I get to India later this month. But there are various aspects of this doctrinally based unawareness that seem to overlap with what’s called “incorrect consideration” – for instance, considering what is nonstatic to be static. So, we might – without asserting or believing in the whole package of the non-Buddhist Indian assertion of atman – still think that we are permanent, that we don’t change, that we are always the same. That would come into the category of incorrect consideration – considering something that changes all the time as not changing.
There can be a doctrinally based form of that as well as an automatically arising form. So, the question, really, in my mind that needs to be settled is when we get rid of each of the four types of incorrect consideration. I would guess that, with the seeing path of mind, we get rid of the doctrinally based incorrect consideration as well. If that were the case, it would be a quite comfortable answer to our dilemma that we raised last time, which is: what if we’ve never studied any of these systems? And we certainly don’t believe in them if we have never studied them in this lifetime.
What Do We Get Rid of With the Seeing Pathway Mind?
What do we get rid of with the seeing pathway of mind, this path of seeing? We, certainly, would get rid of any traces of these incorrect views and doctrinally based unawareness from previous lifetimes. But I think that we would also get rid of any doctrinally based ideas that we might have, like the idea that we are permanent and never change – sort of the myth of being an eternal youth, which we might believe in if we were taught that. But there could be an automatically arising form of that with which we automatically tend to consider ourselves to always be young, even though what we see in the mirror contradicts that. We have various disturbing emotions that can arise on the basis of this unawareness.
If it is doctrinally based, it could be, for instance, pride and arrogance about our mistaken view of the self, the atman. It could be attachment to this view; it could be anger and hostility toward anybody who has a different view; it could be jealousy of donations that are given to people who hold a different view. There are many different types of disturbing emotions that could arise specifically based on this doctrinally based unawareness or confusion. That’s the unawareness.
Obviously, there also are disturbing emotions that arise based on the automatically arising form of unawareness, like thinking, “Me, me, me. I want you to love me.” Then, of course, we have a great deal of desire: “I want to be loved by you, nobody else but you” (I think those are the lyrics of some song in English). We don’t think, “I want to be loved by a body and a mind and a personality on which a person is labeled”; we think, “I want to be loved by you.” Then we have great attachment to that, desire, or anger when the person doesn’t fulfill our wish. We have jealousy, possessiveness, close-mindedness, naivety. We don’t want to believe that the person has other things going on in their life besides us, etc., etc.
With the seeing pathway of mind, we get rid of the doctrinally based form of all of this. With the accustoming pathway of mind, or a path of meditation, we gradually get rid of the automatically arising form of all of this. It’s just a matter of familiarity, working again and again to be familiar with the fact that there is no such thing as such a person. Nobody has that way of existing. People exist, of course, but not in this impossible way.
That’s what voidness is all about or the term “selflessness” – namely, a lack of this impossible self. It means “no such thing.” We need to focus on that, be totally absorbed in the thought “no such thing.” Then, afterwards, even though our minds give rise to that false appearance and it feels like we exist in this impossible way, we realize that this is like an illusion. It seems like we exist as something solid and real, but we don’t exist like that.
Anyway, we have the unawareness link, the first link. Any questions on that? It’s obviously very profound, very deep. We have to really work with it and try to see it in ourselves.
How the Two Obscurations – Emotional and Cognitive – Prevent Liberation and Enlightenment
Participant: There’s this differentiation between liberation and enlightenment. Does this have to do with giving up certain unawareness, certain stages of unawareness, like the doctrinally based ones? Do we get rid of certain ones to reach liberation and others to reach enlightenment?
Dr. Berzin: The question is about what we need to get rid of to achieve liberation and enlightenment.
There are two sets of what are called “obscurations.” They obscure our seeing how we actually exist. There are what are called the “emotional obscurations” and the “cognitive obscurations.” The emotional ones refer to the disturbing emotions, including unawareness. The traces of them, or tendencies of them… this is sometimes translated as the “seeds” of them. The seeds, or traces, or tendencies, of them give rise to the disturbing emotions some of the time. Like attachment and anger, we don’t have every moment of our lives; they only come up some of the time. The difference between what I translate as a “constant habit“ and a “tendency,” is that a constant habit gives rise to something all the time, and a tendency gives rise to it only some of the time – so, occasionally.
What prevents our liberation are the emotional obscurations – so, the disturbing emotions and their traces. That includes the unawareness of how person exists, according to all the non-Prasangika schools. According to the Prasangika School, it also includes the unawareness of how phenomena exist and also the disturbing emotions that are based on that unawareness. Now, this includes both the doctrinally based as well as the automatically arising forms of awareness. OK. The emotional obscurations prevent liberation. We get rid of them when we attain liberation.
The Constant Habits of Our Unawareness Give Rise to Grasping for an Impossible Self in Every Moment
The Mahayana presentation, particularly the Madhayamaka presentation, has an explanation of how the mind gives rise to appearances of impossible ways of existing – namely, appearances of true existence from a Madhayamaka point of view. So, that’s caused by the constant habits of our unawareness. Because we are so habituated or accustomed to the grasping for impossible existence, which means to perceive it and believe in it – not just to perceive but to both perceive and believe in it – our minds makes things appear like that every moment. So, it is a constant habit that produces this. And based on that, we actually believe that this corresponds to reality. So, then we get all sorts of disturbing emotions based on that.
The belief that it is true (that’s unawareness) and the disturbing emotions that come up based on that belief are on the side of the emotional obscurations. To get liberation, we need to be free of those. But even if we are liberated, the mind still produces these appearances, these crazy appearances. Those are called the “cognitive obscurations.” The cognitive obscurations are the constant habits that produce these appearances, and they prevent our enlightenment. Now, why they prevent our enlightenment is the question.
From the Madhyamaka point of view, what is this impossible manner of existence? Impossible manner of existence is that things exist, as I used to describe it, as having a big, solid line around them or being encapsulated in plastic. In the Chittamatra School, they describe it as there being an actual basis for the words of things. What does that mean? That means that we have our words in the dictionary… and Madhayamaka would agree with this as well. Every word is in the dictionary, and it appears as though things exist in these categories and that these categories are really true.
So, when our minds are under the influence of this constant habit, they make things appear as if they were encircled within these categories: “good,” “bad,” “table,” “friend,” “enemy,” etc. That’s why I say “with a line around it”; it’s as if things had a line around them or were encapsulated in plastic. And we can notice that when we look at things. So, it’s not just in our thought, in our conceptual thought; it’s also in our perception. When I look at you, what do I see? I see Andreas. I see a person. I see a man. I see a human being. I see a body. But it appears as though that’s the only thing that I see – as if that person or human being were there by itself, by its own power.
So, what don’t I see? What I don’t see is that you’ve arisen as a human being dependently on all the causes that you have built up in previous lifetimes to be a human being, plus all the generations of your parents and ancestors, plus all the genetic things that make a human being, plus the evolution of the planet and environment that would allow for human beings to live, plus all of history that has shaped the way that you are now and the situation that you are in now. All these different factors – I don’t see all that. It only appears to me as “there’s a person; there’s a human being – Andreas.” And it doesn’t even appear as though you are Andreas dependent on the name “Andreas.”
You are a human being dependent on the name “human being”; somebody came up with the term and defined it. And they don’t even have a good boundary for the term “human being” in terms of the stages of evolution. Which humanoid… you know, where is the boundary demarcating when a humanoid becomes a human being? That’s arbitrary; somebody made it up. And it seems to change all the time.
So, it doesn’t appear like that – that you’ve arisen as a human being dependently on so many causes and conditions. That is a cognitive obscuration. Why? Because then I don’t know all the causes for you having the different types of suffering that you have now. I don’t know your whole emotional and physical make-up that is causing you suffering. And I don’t know what the result would be if I taught you anything. I am explaining this to you now, but I have no idea what the result of that will be and how that will impact not only you but also your interactions with everybody else for the rest of this life and all your future lives and the impact that it will have on them in terms of how they interact with other people. I have no idea. But if I wanted to really be able to help you, as a Buddha, I would need to know all of that. And that’s what the omniscient state of a Buddha is all about.
So long as our minds make things appear isolated, encapsulated in plastic like that. I used to describe that as periscope vision: we are just looking through a little hole in a U-boat, in a submarine. We can’t see the whole thing. As long as we have this limitation, our minds are obscured; we are not omniscient. To get rid of that, we need the understanding of voidness.
From the non-Prasangika point of view, we need to understand the voidness of all phenomena as defined in those schools, not just the voidness of a person. From a Prasangika point of view, the voidness of persons and all phenomena is the same; so, we just have to familiarize ourselves with that voidness more and more and with a stronger motivation, the motivation of bodhichitta. “I have got to reach enlightenment. I have to stop, to achieve a true stopping” – third noble truth, a true stopping – “of my mind producing this garbage, this false appearance.” And we become convinced that producing this false appearance is not part of the nature of the mind because our minds don’t always produce that. If it were part of the nature of the mind, our minds should produce it all the time.
When We Are Focused Non-Conceptually on Voidness, the Mind Does Not Produce an Appearance of True Existence
When we have total absorption on voidness, regardless of which voidness we are talking about in the Buddhist fold, our minds don’t produce an appearance of true existence. And at that point when we have the clear light of death, the mind doesn’t produce an appearance of true existence, of this impossible existence. So, because the mind doesn’t produce it at those times, we are convinced – if we either experience it or take the word of somebody like a Buddha whom we take as a reliable authority, a reliable source of information. We become convinced that it is possible – that if the nature of the mind does not always make appearances of this impossible way of existing, it is possible for there to be an omniscient mind, a mind that can perceive all the connections, interactions. Of course, this gets into a whole, big discussion of the past and future and how we understand that. And that, we’ll have a whole weekend on in September.
Participant: It’s not easy for me to differentiate the cognitive obscurations from the automatically arising because you say…
Dr. Berzin: So, you say it is not easy to differentiate the cognitive obscurations from the automatically arising ones.
From the Prasangika point of view, there are doctrinally based and automatically arising constant habits. Your mind could produce an appearance… Now, this starts to get a little bit complicated because, from the Prasangika point of view, the views of the lower Buddhist schools are also doctrinally based unawareness. So, your mind could produce an appearance, an impossible appearance, based on a lower Buddhist school belief. What would that be? That would be, for instance, from the Svatantrika point of view, that although a person is based on, arises dependently on, the word and concept “person,” there nevertheless is something inside me that makes me “me” and doesn’t make me a “table” or make me “you.” So, the mind could make that appearance. It could also make other impossible appearances based on having been taught and believing in those things, but they could also automatically arise. Then you get into a discussion about whether there is a difference between these two. We don’t want to get into that debate. The same false appearance could arise because you have been taught it and believe it, and it could arise even if you weren’t taught it – so, it could automatically arise.
But cognitive obscurations arise all the time.
Participant: I didn’t quite understand your question except for automatic versus…
Dr. Berzin: His question was, the automatically arising… The confusion is that the automatically arising disturbing emotions… You see, the automatically arising ones don’t arise all the time, whereas the constant habits make false appearances arise all the time.
Giving Rise to False Appearances Is a Cognitive Obscuration; Believing in Those Appearances (the Unawareness) Is an Emotional Obscuration
Participant: The automatically arising ideas that you make up about yourself or another one sounds a lot like doing this cognitive thing – that you perceive things to be like that. I cannot figure…
Dr. Berzin: Oh. No, no, no. It’s not just that you perceive. For the emotional one… OK, the mind makes this impossible appearance, and you perceive it. That’s on the cognitive obscuration side. Believing that it’s true – that’s unawareness; that’s on the emotional side. It’s only when you believe that it’s true that you get disturbing emotions. If you don’t believe it’s true… For arhats, the mind still makes this garbage appear, but they don’t believe it.
Participant: And then you don’t cognize it.
Dr. Berzin: You see it, but you don’t believe it. And you don’t respond emotionally to it.
Participant: But the second part, the believing or not believing, you don’t define as cognizing.
Dr. Berzin: Believing or not believing is on the emotional side. And just perceiving, the mind making that appearance, making it look that way – that’s cognitive.
Participant: Was automatisch erscheint ist kognitiv.
Dr. Berzin: Right. The cognitive…
Participant: Is automatic.
Dr. Berzin: Yeah, but the difference between automatic and doctrinally based is whether or not somebody taught you that. The mind automatically (this is Prasangika) makes an appearance of there being something unique in me that makes me “me.”
Participant: And you believe it.
Dr. Berzin: And you believe it. You don’t have to believe it, but you believe it. But that automatically arising thing that comes all the time – you also could have been taught that if you were a Svatantrika.
Participant: But in the end, it doesn’t matter if somebody taught or it’s…
Dr. Berzin: Right. It doesn’t matter in the end whether you were taught it or whether it automatically arises: it comes anyway. Except that there are different stages of what you get rid of, different stages at which you get rid of them. But here we are talking about very, very fine distinctions. Very fine distinctions. And of course, there are many different opinions on it.
Participant: To start getting rid of it, you start to see it as really not valid, and you start to deconstruct it.
Dr. Berzin: Right. To get rid of it, basically, you start by seeing that, even though it seems like this, it appears like this, it’s not referring to anything real. You don’t believe in it.
Participant: And then you get used to that.
Dr. Berzin: And then you get used to that. And the more and more you focus on “no such thing,” in other words, the more experience you have of being in a state in which it doesn’t appear like that (which is when you’re totally absorbed on voidness), the more the momentum of your mind constantly giving rise to it is broken. And the longer you can stay in that state of no appearance, the closer you come to bringing the habit of making that appearance to an end. That’s how it works.
Participant: But the first step is that you have this appearance, but you don’t…
Dr. Berzin: The first step is not to believe in the appearance and not to believe in it based on… First step is what you have been doctrinally taught.
Participant: To question that.
Dr. Berzin: To question that. If you have been taught to believe in an eternal soul that never changes and is a partless thing that can leave your body and exist independently of it, you first have to get rid of that.
Now, of course, it could seem as though that’s how you are. That’s what I was saying is the question that I have to clarify because from the Buddhist point of view, they talk about the whole package of how these non-Buddhist Indian schools describe the soul. But I think that parts of the package we certainly experience. So, where that fits into this scheme is a little bit unclear to me still. But certainly, we get rid of it. OK?
Participant: If all mental habits are dissolved or discontinued, is the mind then gone?
Dr. Berzin: That’s a very good question. When all these false habits are gone, is that the end of the mind? No. The mental continuum goes on forever. What is the nature of the mind that’s there all the time, even when we are totally absorbed on voidness? What’s there are the defining characteristics. You can’t find them inside the object. It’s not that… what shall we say? There are defining characteristics, but the defining characteristics don’t exist inside something, independently of mental labeling.
What are the defining characteristics of mind? Mind is talking about mental activity. It’s not talking about a thing, an object. So, what is mental activity? Mental activity is the giving rise to appearances and the cognizing of them. And giving rise to an appearance, to a mental hologram (as I describe it), and perceiving that mental hologram are the same activity. And it’s only that, meaning that there is nothing separate that’s doing it or a person that’s doing it, that’s making it happen. So, that continues.
Pure and Impure Appearances
Now, there are what are called “pure appearances” and “impure appearances.” An impure appearance would be the appearance of things encapsulated in plastic – this false appearance. That’s an impure appearance. Now, when the mind stops producing that, the mind is then capable of giving rise to a pure appearance. What is a pure appearance? This is not so easy. A pure appearance is the interconnectedness of everything – not just cut off, like when we look through a periscope. How is it represented? It’s represented by mandalas and deities and all these sorts of things. But we shouldn’t think that that is all that we perceive when we are Buddhas – that everything is a pure land or that everyone is a Buddha and stuff like that. That has to be understood properly; otherwise, we tend to think something very weird.
In the Sakya view, they explain it very nicely. They say that the ordinary appearance and the sort of nirvana appearance – so, the appearance as a human being and the appearance as Chenrezig or Tara – are like two quantum levels that the energies of the body are simultaneously vibrating at. This Sakya view, I think, is a very nice explanation that fits very nicely with our modern quantum mechanics because we could imagine existing either as Anika or as Tara, both with a big, solid line around them, encapsulated in plastic. So, we could have a wrong appearance of both, or we could have an appearance of both that shows the interdependence of everything.
But when they describe an omniscient mind, which is what sees pure appearances… omniscient mind is aware of everything simultaneously. Everything – all directions and all time. The part that most of us have difficulty with is time. That’s why it’s important to understand that. It’s not that everything is happening at the same time.
Some of you might have gone to His Holiness’s teachings in Hamburg on Aryadeva’s Four Hundred Verses. Although His Holiness went through it extremely quickly, there was a whole chapter about time and refuting false views about time that he went into in rather great depth. So, it’s not so easy, actually.
Questions
Participant: I’m a bit confused about Brahma because people in Mauritius believe in Indian philosophy that there is Brahma, there is a soul and the third eye. So, I get confused.
Dr. Berzin: So, she, having been raised in a Hindu environment, is a little bit confused about Brahma, the third eye, and so on. The point is, the third eye represents the eye of deep awareness, or the wisdom eye. It’s not to be taken literally as drill a hole in your forehead. So, we can develop that eye of deep awareness. That’s not a problem.
The problem with Brahma from a Buddhist point of view is with Brahma being a creator because a creator that can create independently doesn’t make any sense; it’s illogical. There are many, many discussions about the illogical points of that. When does Brahma create? If it’s when he wishes to create, then he is under the influence of a wish. And where does the wish come from? So, the wish must have existed before Brahma. Then it gets logically problematic.
What Does It Mean That Atman Is Brahma, One with the Universe?
Now, the atman being equivalent to Brahma in the sense of the individual being equivalent to the universe (one with everything) – this depends on how one understands that. As I said last time, Buddhism is an Indian philosophy, so most of the issues that are treated in the Hindu schools Buddhism also speaks about. It’s just a matter of how you understand them. So, Buddhism does say that there is a person, or a soul – they even sometimes use the word “atman” – that has no beginning and no end; it’s eternal. A person is labeled onto something; it has to have a basis. So, the basis is the clear light mind, the individual clear light mind, and the energy of that clear light mind. Now, when that person is a Buddha – omniscient – that mind is aware of everything. So, it is the size of the universe.
What does Buddhism also object to? That Brahma, or the atman, has no parts. Buddhism says it has parts in terms of being aware of this and that and this and that; it is not that everything is one big, undifferentiated soup. In some of the Hindu philosophies, like in Vedanta, they say that it’s all, literally, an illusion. Well, what’s an illusion is the false appearance, not the conventional appearance. The conventional appearance is like an illusion. So, there are individual things. Individual things appear as though they exist isolated by themselves. That’s false. But there are still individual things that are interconnected.
The mind of an enlightened being covers the whole universe. So, it is the size of the universe. And the energy of that mind likewise covers the whole universe. This is why a Buddha can appear everywhere simultaneously. And you could label “me,” the atman of a Buddha, on that. So, in that sense, it’s very similar to these Hindu beliefs of the equivalence… not quite the equivalence but the relationship between the liberated person, atman, and the whole universe. It’s just, what is that relationship? This is where Buddhism comes in and says they are not totally the same; they are not totally equivalent. And it’s very complex what the relationship is. Even within Hinduism, there are many, many schools and many different philosophers, and they have quite different views among themselves on all these very specific, philosophical points.
Participant: It’s the most diverse religion in its thought.
Dr. Berzin: That Hinduism is the most diverse religion or Buddhism? I would say all the Indian schools are the most diverse. Mind you, there are an awful lot of different sects within Christianity. An awful lot. I don’t know if you could count to see who has the most, but there certainly is a great deal of diversity of views within the general sphere of Indian thought. The thing that often we lose sight of if we’ve only studied Buddhism is that the issues treated are the same issues that have been treated in almost all of the other Indian schools. It’s just how you understand them. It’s like in Christianity – how do you understand the trinity? How do you understand God? There are certain basic issues that everybody talks about, but they understand it differently. So, same thing.
Buddhism is definitely an Indian religion and comes out of Indian thought. Then, of course, there’s the whole question of the universality of it. That was where the questions about these doctrinally based wrong views came in.
When you talk about Brahma… you also have the four ages, with the kaliyuga being a fourth age. Now, Hinduism, as far as I understand, talks about an infinite continuity of these four yugas, of these four ages. And in each age, there is going to be a Brahma who creates within that age. But there’s no beginning and no end. Buddhism says that as well. It’s just that Brahma isn’t the one who actually creates anything within that age. It’s just that Brahma is the first being to appear and the last one to go. So, Brahma thinks that he created everything, and everybody else thinks that he created everything. So, Buddhism explains how that belief arose. But we are talking about the same basic idea of no beginning and no end and repeating cycles of universes.
Don’t worry. The Chinese had as much difficulty as the Westerners to try to understand any of this.
Participant: But it isn’t really relevant because the Westerners have other ideas. They have all these scientific explanations…
Dr. Berzin: Right. Westerners have all sorts of scientific explanations as well. But one of the big thrusts and interests of His Holiness the Dalai Lama is to make Buddhism compatible with Western science and to throw out anything that Western science proves doesn’t exist, like Mount Meru, the four continents, and the size of the sun and the moon and distance of them from the earth. That he says over and over again – that this is rubbish. But then there was this lovely statement by His Holiness, which was that Buddha didn’t come to this world to teach us geography: he came to teach us how to gain liberation. So, keep it clear. The geography lesson was just appropriate to what people in those times believed.
Participant: Then science today – they have all sorts of theories, but even they…
Dr. Berzin: That’s right. Science today as well, every five to ten years, changes its theories. That’s why His Holiness is saying that it’s not that we should believe whatever science asserts. What he is saying is that whatever science can prove doesn’t exist we will drop.
Participant: At least science, when it’s properly done, says this is a theory. They don’t say that it is like this but that it is a theory.
Dr. Berzin: Right. So, she’s saying at least scientists say that this is a theory.
Participant: Which explains this and this and this. But it has limitations.
Dr. Berzin: Right. Do they ever state their theories as dogma? I would imagine some do.
Participant: It’s personal how each person holds his views. Some don’t even publish some of their theories.
Dr. Berzin: But emotionally, they may feel that.
Participant: Or at least they say that there are the laws – this is the law, this law. At least they say that it’s not absolute but that a law holds true in this limited way.
Dr. Berzin: Right. They would say that there are laws that hold true. Well, Buddhism is very good in that regard – that laws are mentally constructed as a means to understand what’s happening and that the laws don’t exist somewhere out there by themselves. If you understand like that, it’s very easy to update the laws. Buddhism is very helpful that way.
Participant: Can you find this explicitly that it said it like this?
Dr. Berzin: Well, they would say that nothing exists from its own side, by its own power. They don’t talk about the laws of science. There are certain things that are just the way things are for no reason. For example, why does everybody want to be happy and nobody wants to be unhappy? That’s just the way things are. Why is there cause and effect? Well, there just is. But that doesn’t mean these things exist from their own side, by their own power. And to ask why does everybody want to be happy and nobody wants to be unhappy – a Zen master would hit you over the head with a stick to answer that. Then you would know why you want to be happy and not unhappy.
Participant: Zen masters – they used to do that.
Dr. Berzin: Yeah, the Zen masters definitely did that. For some questions, that’s the most effective way of answering.
Participant: When you are feeling sleepy when you are in meditation…
Dr. Berzin: Feeling sleepy – that’s a different purpose. That’s a different purpose. But when you start questioning, “Do I exist?” and so on, then a good smack with a stick will demonstrate to you that you do in fact exist. OK?
We go on to the second link. We have covered the first link, unawareness. The second link is… Do you need a moment to reflect?
The Second Link: Affecting Variables (Karmic Impulses)
The next link is what is called “affecting variables.” It’s the way that I translate it. I forget how it is normally translated. It’s the word samskara in Sanskrit. An affecting variable is something that changes: it’s variable. And it is “affecting”: it will affect what we experience. This refers to karma, specifically to throwing karma.
Differentiating the Karmic Impulse to Do Something from the Wish to Do It
There are many, many different theories of what karma refers to. But if we speak in a very basic way, we can say that karma (las) is an impulse to do something. It can also be an impulse with which we do something – an impulse that brings us into doing something. We are not talking about the wish to do something. Say I’m on a diet – “I would like to eat some cheesecake.” That is simply a wish (‘dod-pa). It could be connected with greed, desire, attachment and so on. Karma refers to the impulse with which I actually go to the refrigerator or go to the store to buy it so that I can stick it in my mouth and eat it. There’s quite a difference between the wish, “I would love to eat some cheesecake,” and that impulse of energy that actually gets me to go do it. That’s the karma.
Participant: So, it’s not when you pass by a bakery and see cheesecake, and then it is, “Oh, I want it”?
Dr. Berzin: No. “I want it” – that’s the wish.
Participant: But it’s an impulse.
Dr. Berzin: Karma is the impulse that actually moves you to do it.
Participant: There is a kind of craving with it. It’s a sort of “I want to have it.”
Dr. Berzin: You could think about it. You could have the impulse, or urge, to think, “Well, how could I go about doing it? Maybe I don’t have enough money. But if I save money, if I walk rather than take the U-Bahn, or take the bus, then I’ll have enough money to buy the cheesecake.” Or “If I don’t eat rice or bread with my meal, I can have the cake.” So, you think about and even plan how to do it. That’s the mental karma – the impulse that gets you into the action of thinking. But just the simple greed or desire to have it – that’s a disturbing emotion.
Participant: So, you have to act, to put it into action.
Dr. Berzin: Before you have the impulse to put it into action, to actually do it, you could think it over. If you decide to do it and then do it, you have the mental karma (the impulse for a mental action) and the physical karma (the impulse for a physical action).
Breaking Habits – Not Acting on the Feeling of Liking Something
Karma doesn’t ripen into karma; it ripens into this wishing. More specifically, it ripens into the feeling of liking to do something (dga’-ba, Skt. priti): you feel like doing something. Because of your karmic habits and tendencies, you like cheesecake, and you feel like eating it. So, karma – the aftermath of karma – ripens into a feeling of liking it, of wanting it. Then that gives rise to the karmic impulse. But it’s not only the impulse; it’s also the intention that, “OK, I’m going to do it.” Intention always accompanies a karmic impulse.
These are fine distinctions, but they are important for knowing where you can stop the whole chain events that leads to breaking your diet. Liking cheesecake and wanting to eat it is not the major problem. It’s not the first problem. The first problem to attack is that wish – feeling like having it.
Participant: So, if I want it and I forget it, then it’s…
Dr. Berzin: If you see it and think, “I want it,” and then forget about it, or if you decide, “No, I’m not going to eat it,” then you’re OK.
Participant: It’s discipline.
Dr. Berzin: It’s discipline, right. The first step is discriminating or differentiating between the benefits and the disadvantages of having the cheesecake and remembering your motivation for keeping your diet – which could be for health reasons, for cosmetic reasons, whatever – and then acting on that with discipline.
Participant: And then you can rejoice.
Dr. Berzin: And then you can rejoice. Yes, when you go home and eat your salad instead…
Participant: With no dressing. Then it’s even better.
Dr. Berzin: Right! Then, of course, you can think of various methods for overcoming the greed and desire for the cheesecake, like thinking about what it looks like after you’ve chewed it a few times and spit it back on your plate.
Participant: The point is not to act on it.
Dr. Berzin: The point is not to act on it.
Participant: Not to act on the impulse.
Dr. Berzin: Not to act on the wish, the feeling. The impulse draws you into the action. The wish, or feeling, doesn’t necessarily draw you into the action.
Participant: Yes, yes.
Dr. Berzin: We still like various things. It doesn’t matter how much of a diet that I am on, I still like chocolate, and I still like cheesecake. But eventually, I don’t want to eat it. So, there are stages. I like it, but I don’t really want to eat it. One goes through stages.
These things, I think, are quite important to differentiate because it allows us to have a little bit more peace of mind. There is nothing wrong with liking it.
Participant: Especially if you are compulsive about something, it’s difficult to see this difference.
Dr. Berzin: If you are compulsive about it, it’s difficult to see the difference because you don’t slow down the process enough. If you slow down the process, you would see the stages involved: I like it, I would like to have it, I’m going to have it. When it’s compulsive, you just go through that sequence very, very quickly. Therefore, meditations like in the Theravada tradition of so-called mindfulness, such as the walking meditation where you slow things down to an unbelievably slow pace – “I’m intending to lift my left foot. I’m lifting it. I want to move it forward,” and so on – helps you to slow down that process when a compulsion is involved. So, it’s useful training.
Participant: You are talking especially about the second link.
Dr. Berzin: The second link is talking about this – that based on unawareness, I am unaware of the fact that the cake… Well, remember, unawareness, here, has to do with the unawareness of persons.
Participant: Specifically, that it comes from the unawareness. But you were talking about the karma that comes from… that you have to do something – that this has to be involved. In Tsongkhapa’s text, it says that you can also collect karma from thinking over the situation again and again.
Dr. Berzin: Right, as you say, Tsongkhapa speaks about (not only Tsongkhapa; it goes way back in all the abhidharmas) mental karma as well as physical and verbal karma. So, that was why I was saying that thinking about how can I get this cake….
Participant: Marianna was asking that it’s only if you do it…
Dr. Berzin: Well, I was using the word “do” in a very general sense to refer to thinking, speaking, or acting: thinking about going into the store and how I will have the money; speaking as in asking for it; and doing as in actually buying it and eating it. You can change your mind. You could buy it, and then give it away as a present – feed it to the dog.
Participant: But you think twice before you…
Dr. Berzin: Right. So, you think twice before doing it.
What Is the Connection Between the Unawareness of How “I” Exist and Throwing Karma?
But the thing is to understand the connection between the unawareness of how I exist and this type of karma, referring to throwing karma. So, it’s talking about something done with a strong motivation. So, can you put the two together?
Participant: I can’t understand…
Dr. Berzin: How do you get from unawareness to throwing karma, to this affecting variable?
Participant: “Throwing”?
Dr. Berzin: “Throwing” means it throws you into another rebirth.
There are various strengths of karma. Some types of karma have the strength to throw you into a next rebirth; so, it generates the type of rebirth that you are going to have. Then there is completing karma, which is with a weaker motivation, and that completes the circumstances of that rebirth. So, throwing karma causes you to be reborn as a human being or as a dog, for example. Completing karma completes the circumstances as a human being or a dog. So, for example, as a human, you are either born into a beggar family and are deformed, or you are a beautiful princess. As a dog, you are either a street dog in India, or you are the pet dog of the Dalai Lama.
Participant: He has a pet dog?
Dr. Berzin: Does he have a pet dog? I really don’t know. But my own teacher Serkong Rinpoche had a dog and a cat. And the young Serkong Rinpoche has two dogs. Very amazing dogs, I must say. Very interesting. There are wild monkeys where he lives. And there is a wild monkey that comes and plays with the dogs. Monkeys and dogs don’t get along normally at all. Dogs usually go crazy and bark to get rid of them. But they play. It’s really weird.
Here, with the twelve links, we are talking about the mechanism that drives samsara, that drives rebirth. So, when we talk about rebirth and karma, we have to talk about throwing karma, the type of karma that will cause a particular rebirth state. It causes rebirth; it’s part of the mechanism for rebirth.
What happens is that there is an impulse to do an action. One theory is that karma is always a mental impulse (sems-pa, urge), a mental factor (sems-byung, subsidiary awareness). It is the mental urge that prods the mind into initiating, carrying out and concluding an action of the body, speech or mind. The other theory is that karma is a mental impulse only with regard to mental actions. With regard to physical and verbal actions, the karmic impulse is a form of physical phenomena. These are just two different theories. In any case, this gets to the third link. But let’s just get the second link correct.
The Connection Is Grasping for an “I” – Me, Me, Me
What is the relationship between unawareness about how a person exists and karma, throwing karma? Can anyone give me an example?
Participant: It’s grasping for a person, for an “I.”
Dr. Berzin: Right. Me, me, me – “I want the cake.” It’s not so much ignorance about the cake; it’s ignorance about me – that “I want this. I want to do this. I deserve this. I deserve a treat.” What is this “I” that deserves the treat? We certainly don’t think of the “I” in terms of “there is a body and mind, and there is an ‘I’ that is labeled on it.” So, what is it that wants this cheesecake? We just think in terms of “me” – “I want it, and I am going to get it. I deserve it.” “I deserve a treat today. I have been a good boy, a good girl all week, and now I can have my treat, the cheesecake.” Based on that belief, then not only is there the wish to eat it, but we actually have the urge to act on it, and we do act on it.
“Me – you just insulted me!” That activates the urge to yell at somebody, to say nasty things back at them, and to actually do it. Or “Me – I want you to love me. I want to be loved.” So, then we do something nice for the other person. We bake them a cheesecake so that they will like you.
Participant: Maybe I should make you a cheesecake then.
Dr. Berzin: You want me to like you then. With low-fat cheese and no sugar, just this artificial, no calorie sugar. [Laughter]
This is an important point to understand – that this strong, false belief in “me” is what brings on these karmic impulses, these affecting variables. They affect our behavior and affect what we will experience in the future. OK? Then the next links describe how that works.
So, we end with a dedication. We think, “Whatever positive force…” That was karma. I mean, we did something, so there’s some positive force from that, which we will get into with the next links. We don’t want just to further samsara, so we dedicate.