Review
We are going through the graded stages of the path, the lam-rim, dealing with how we develop ourselves along the Buddhist spiritual path. For this, we have three stages of motivation, what we are aiming for. Initially, we are aiming for better rebirths (this assumes, of course, that we have rebirth). We want to be able to continue on the spiritual path, so we need to continue to have precious rebirths, specifically precious human rebirths. Our further goal, then, is to achieve liberation from uncontrollably recurring rebirth since that’s filled with all sorts of sufferings and difficulties. Then, beyond that, since everybody else is in the same type of situation, we aim to achieve the enlightened state of a Buddha so that we can help them as much as is actually possible. Of course, as Buddhas, we are not able to just eliminate everybody’s problem: one can only show the way (as a Buddha can). It’s up to people to actually follow. But as Buddhas, we would be able to know what the right advice or help would be to give someone.
Initial Scope
Appreciating the Precious Human Rebirth
Then we started with the initial level of motivation, the initial scope. We began with appreciating the precious human bodies that we have. First of all, we need to recognize that and to recognize the respites that we have (that means temporary freedom) from the most difficult situations in which we’d have no opportunity to practice or to make any type of spiritual progress. But the precious human rebirth is only a temporary freedom; it’s not going to last unless we take advance of it and try to make it continue in future lives. Our lives are also enriched with all sorts of opportunities that will allow us to grow spiritually, all of which are very difficult to come by. We looked at the causes for a precious human rebirth, how difficult it is to obtain, and how easily it will be lost with death.
Death and Impermanence
That brought us into the discussion of death and impermanence. Death will come for sure to everyone. There’s nobody who was ever born that has not died. In fact, the cause for dying is being born. There is no certainty about when death will happen, and at the time death nothing will be of any great help to us except the positive habits that we have built up on our mental continuums by taking the preventive measures to avoid things getting worse. “Preventive measures” is the translation of the word “Dharma,” something to hold us back from suffering.
Dreading Worse Rebirths
We saw what could happen to us very easily if we haven’t built up sufficient positive habits with these preventive measures, and that would be a rebirth in one of the worst states of existence. This could be in the so-called hell realms, being a trapped being in the joyless realms, experiencing much, much further on the spectrum of suffering and pain than we can experience now with a human body. Instead, we would have a body that would be able to support extreme pain and suffering without going unconscious like our human bodies do. We could also be reborn as a clutching ghost, a “hungry ghost” as they’re called in Chinese. In that type of situation, we would have all sorts of restrictions that prevent us from taking in food and liquid. We’d always be filled with paranoia because of being chased and so on. It’s quite a horrible existence. They can’t get any satisfaction or anything of anything. The third type of worst rebirth is as an animal. Here, we think of a creeping creature on the floor and how insects and other animals are eaten alive by different animals and so on. This is quite awful as well.
Safe Direction
We are then moved by a dread of being reborn in these types of states. It’s a healthy sense of fear in the sense that we know that there is a way out. It’s not a hopeless and helpless state of fear that paralyzes us but a healthy state in which we see that this is what we really don’t want and at the same time, seeing that there is a way to avoid that. And that is putting a safe and positive direction in our lives, so-called refuge, the direction of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. On the deepest level, the ultimate level, Dharma refers to what is possible for a mental continuum to achieve based on its natural purity. That’s a state in which all the disturbing emotions, all the karma, these karmic impulses, and so on have stopped forever, are gone forever. Likewise, it’s a state in which the insights, or paths of mind, or true paths, whatever you want to call them, bring about these true stoppings and are a result of these true stoppings. This is the direction that we want to go in. That’s the ultimate Dharma. The Buddhas are those who have achieved this in full and who teach us how to achieve it. The Arya Sangha are those who have achieved all of these things on their mental continuums in part. They’ve achieved some of it but not all of it.
Refraining from Destructive Behavior According to the Principles of Karma
To go in that direction, the first thing that we want to do is to avoid the gross suffering of pain, the so-called suffering of suffering. For that, we need to avoid destructive behavior since that is the cause. This brought us into the whole discussion of karma. We went through all of that in great detail. Then, there are still the sufferings of change, which is referring to our ordinary type of happiness and pleasure, which never lasts and is ultimately unsatisfying. If we have too much of it, it turns into pain and discomfort, like eating too much food that we like. Even deeper, there is the all-pervasive suffering of continuing to be reborn again and again with the type of body and mind that contain all the seeds, as it were, that will bring us more suffering of pain and more suffering of our ordinary type of pleasure… a body that just perpetuates these things.
Intermediate Scope
In order to get rid of those types of sufferings, we move on to the intermediate scope of motivation, which is to gain liberation from uncontrollably recurring rebirth altogether.
The Suffering of the Better Rebirth States and of Samsara in General
We have gone through the sufferings of the better states of rebirth. We’ve seen that whether we are reborn as a human or as a demigod, always jealous, fighting with the gods, or as a god… the gods have, at least on certain levels of the gods, some types of pleasures. But their lives are quite trivial, and at the end of their lives, everybody ignores them, and they have the terrible suffering of seeing that they are going to fall from their godly state. So, we don’t want that. We also looked at the sufferings of samsara in general. This is what we want to achieve a true stopping of. In order to achieve a true stopping of it, we need to understand the causes and eliminate the causes.
The Causes of Suffering – The Disturbing Emotions and Attitudes
That brought us to the discussion of the causes of suffering, the causes of rebirth. For that, we have the discussion of the disturbing emotions because the disturbing emotions are, when we act on the basis of them, what build up karma. They build up not only negative karma but also positive karma, which also perpetuates our uncontrollably recurring existence. From negative karma, we have unhappiness and pain. From positive karma, we have the unsatisfying type of pleasure and happiness.
With the disturbing emotions, we have been dealing with the six so-called root disturbing emotions – five that are not together with an outlook (so-called outlook), and one that is with. The one that is with an outlook has five subcategories.
We have dealt with the ones without an outlook. These are:
- Longing desire, which is when we don’t have something, and we want to get it. When we have it but don’t want to let go – that’s attachment. If we have it, but we want more and more – that’s greed.
- Hostility or anger, with which we want to get rid of something.
- Unawareness, with which we just basically don’t know either cause and effect or how we and everything exist. When it is together with destructive behavior, it’s called “naivety” or “closed-mindedness” (moha). When it is more in general, it’s just called unawareness, or ignorance. According to Dharkakirti, it is mis-knowing, which is a subcategory.
- Pride, or arrogance, with which we are puffed up about some quality – basically, about “me.”
- Indecisive wavering, which is about something that is true, particularly in terms of the teachings, although we saw that indecisiveness about anything can be debilitating.
All of these five disturbing emotions that are without an outlook can occur both in conceptual and non-conceptual cognition. Beforehand, we need to have encountered an object that we are going to aim the disturbing emotion at, which means that we need to have a state of mind in which we are not free from this disturbing emotion. We also need to have incorrect consideration of that object.
Incorrect Consideration – The Four Main Ones
Incorrect consideration occurs only during conceptual cognition. ”Consideration” means how we take something to mind. So, let’s say that we take an impure object to mind. With incorrect consideration, we take it to mind as being pure; so, a dirty or defiled object, we take to mind as being clean. An impermanent, or nonstatic, changing phenomenon, we take to mind as being static. Or something that lacks a solid identity, a solid existence, we take to mind as having that. So, this comes before. Of course, there are many other types of incorrect consideration, but these are the four main ones.
Then we have the disturbing emotions. For instance, with longing desire, there is the incorrect consideration that it has only good qualities, and we are always emphasizing and exaggerating the good qualities, thinking that it doesn’t have any bad qualities. So, we’re only looking at these positive things. And we find that so attractive – so, “I’ve got to get it!” We don’t think of anything negative about it. The same thing with anger or hostility that’s aimed at a living being, sentient being. We have incorrect consideration of the negative qualities, and we make them bigger than they actually are. We consider their good qualities as being nothing; we don’t even count them or consider them. So, then we have this anger and repulsion.
This disturbing emotion can continue in sensory non-conceptual cognition when incorrect consideration isn’t active. At that time, the disturbing emotion is a basis having the individual markers (mtshan-gzhi) of both a disturbing emotion and an incorrect consideration. In other words, a disturbing emotion in a sense cognition has a marker that indicates that on its basis you can certify that it is a disturbing emotion and another marker that indicates that you can also certify the no-longer-happening of the incorrect consideration that accompanied the disturbing emotion in an immediately preceding conceptual cognition. It is like the disturbing emotion is carried into the sensory cognition by the force of the incorrect consideration that accompanied it during the immediately preceding conceptual cognition but that does not accompany it manifestly now. Anyway, these five disturbing emotions can occur in non-conceptual cognition as well.
The Five Deluded Outlooks
The disturbing ones with an outlook, which is what we are in the middle of discussing, only occur during conceptual cognition, not during non-conceptual cognition. An outlook, here, can also be translated as a “view.” These “disturbing attitudes,” as I call them, are mental factors. They are subsidiary awarenesses that accompany the consciousness and other mental factors in cognizing an object through the medium of a certain interpolation. They latch onto the object, regard the interpolation through which the object is being cognized with a certain view, and discriminate and certify incorrectly that the object actually exists in the way that they regard it. That means they have been preceded by another conceptual cognition that has assessed the object (it doesn’t have to be one millisecond before; it could be way in the past), and that latched onto the object and regarded it with incorrect consideration.
A Deluded Outlook toward a Transitory Network
We saw that the first one of these, which is the most fundamental one, is a deluded outlook toward a transitory network. The transitory network refers to the network of our aggregates: body, mind, emotions, feelings, distinguishing, etc., and the various objects that we perceive as well – sights, sounds, conventional objects – when they are part of our cognitions, when we are aware of them. It seeks and latches onto these things with the attitude of “me” – so, the self – as being identical with one or more items from the network of aggregates. The example that we gave was that when you hurt your hand, you say, “I hurt myself,” as if the hand were “me.” The other one is in terms of “mine”: my hand, my mind, my body, this type of thing – so, a “me” that is separate. And underlying all of this is grasping for a solid existence of “me” and from a Prasangika point of view, a solid existence of all phenomena – so, truly established existence from its own side, independently of everything, etc. It also has an incorrect consideration as well, the incorrect consideration of what doesn’t have this type of true existence to have that true existence.
Also, we have the attitudes of “me” and “mine,” which are based on the attitudes of “one” and “many,” “same” and “different” with regard to ourselves as persons and the aggregates and all of that based on misknowing how we exist. So, with that whole package of attitudes and incorrect considerations, which we can sum up in terms of the attitude of “me” or “mine,” this disturbing attitude is actually the mental factor that will seek and apply this falso identity of “me” or “mine” onto something in our experience.
Obviously, to get rid of that disturbing outlook, we need to get rid of the incorrect considerations and, more fundamentally, the underlying unawareness. If we could get rid of these things, that disturbing outlook would be gone. That underlines the importance of understanding voidness of truly established existence in order to get rid of these disturbing emotions.
So, we had this deluded outlook toward a transitory network. That was the first of these five deluded outlooks.
An Extreme Outlook
The second was an extreme outlook, which we said was based on the previous disturbing outlook. From Tsongkhapa’s point of view, the previous outlook is aimed at the conventional “me.” From Vasubandhu’s and Asanga’s point of view, it is aimed at the aggregates. So, from Tsongkhapa’s point of view, this extreme outlook considers that the “me,” which is seen as either totally identical with or completely separate from some part of the aggregates, either (1) as permanent – so, lasting forever, never changing (that’s the absolutist or eternalist extreme); or (2) as having no continuity in future lives, meaning that at the end of this life, we’ll just go to nothing (that’s the nihilist point of view).
According to Vasubandhu, since it is aimed at the aggregates, this attitude is that (1) some network of these aggregates – for instance, my body – will last forever, without changing: “I’ll be eternally young. I will eternally have my full memory,”… or my money, whatever it might be that’s “mine”; or that (2) at the time of death, there will be no continuity in future lives, that we won’t have further aggregates.
Holding a Deluded Outlook as Supreme
The third one was holding a deluded outlook as supreme. That refers either to the previous two or to the last one, the distorted outlook, as being the best outlook to have – “This is the best thing that we could have; it is really correct,” and so on. So, there is a lot of stubbornness involved here.
Remember, we saw that with these deluded outlooks, (1) we tolerate them because we don’t discriminate that they bring on suffering; (2) we have attachment to them because we don’t realize they’re deluded; (3) we consider them very clever, very intelligent; (4) we tightly hold onto the conceptual framework that they accompany, which means we are very stubborn; (5) we have the speculation or assumption/presumption that they are correct.
As I said, these deluded outlooks seem to come closest to our Western concept of “having an attitude” about something.
This is what we have covered up until now. Any questions? I did a rather long review because we have someone new here in the room and also because this is very complicated material. So, any questions? If not, we will move on.
Participant: You mentioned that there are six disturbing emotions.
Dr. Berzin: There are six disturbing emotions. Actually, there are ten because the sixth of them is made up of five.
Participant: Then you mentioned five different emotions and attitudes?
Dr. Berzin: Right, there are five disturbing emotions; the sixth one is the disturbing attitudes. These disturbing attitudes are divided into five; there are five of them. So, actually, when you add them up, there are ten, but we know that, in Buddhism, the way of counting and putting things together is not always symmetrical. So, they’re counted as six, but actually there are ten because five of them are counted as one.
Holding a Deluded Morality or Conduct as Supreme
The fourth of these deluded outlooks is holding a deluded morality or conduct as supreme.
- This regards as purified, liberated, and definitely delivered (which we will explain shortly) some deluded morality or conduct (we’ll also define those) and the samsara-perpetuating aggregate factors on which the deluded morality or conduct is based.
So, it regards a certain type of morality or conduct that’s based on some member of our aggregates as being purified, liberated, or definitely delivered. So, what does this refer to?
It derives from the deluded outlook toward the transitory network (the one that identifies things with “me” and “mine”), holding a deluded outlook as extreme, or the distorted outlook (the outlook that there is no cause and effect, that there is no point in being good, etc.). So, it’s based on one or more of these.
Getting rid of deluded morality means ridding ourselves of some trivial manner of behavior that is meaningless to give up – for instance (the example that Tsongkhapa uses), standing on two feet. Deluded conduct is decisively engaging our way of dressing, our bodies or our speech in some trivial manner that is meaningless to adopt, such as the ascetic practice of standing naked on one foot in the hot sun (a practice done by some yogis in India).
So, one is giving up something that is silly to give up, like standing on two feet. The other one is doing something that is also silly and ultimately meaningless, like standing naked on one foot in the sun.
- It regards the morality or conduct as a path that “purifies” us from negative karmic force (that’s what purify means). It “liberates” us from negative karmic potential and from the disturbing emotions. And it “definitely delivers us” from samsara (uncontrollably recurring rebirth).
Each word in the definition of this disturbing outlook has to be defined in order to understand what it is talking about.
Discussion
Looking at Examples from Our Own Lives
How can we relate to this? Most of us don’t give up standing on two feet or stand naked on one foot in the sun for months on end, thinking that this is a path to liberation and that we are going to be free from negative karma and the disturbing emotions and gain freedom from uncontrollably recurring rebirth. Do we have anything in our experience that could remotely resemble this?
Jorge?
Participant: I think there are a lot. If you take an esoteric point of view or an esoteric lifestyle, there’s lots of these.
Dr. Berzin: So, an esoteric lifestyle could have a lot of these, like, for instance, giving up dressing in ordinary clothes and wearing only white clothes.
I don’t mean to be personal, but vegetarianism could be taken this way; it could be seen as path that’s going to deliver us from all anger, desire and negative karma and somehow bring us liberation. We are not denying the beneficial qualities of vegetarianism. but to see it as this sort of ultimate path is really to exaggerate the benefits very much.
What else?
Participant: Doing things like burning incense is meaningless.
Dr. Berzin: Burning incense? Well, we’d have to think that this will somehow make us holy (if we want to do a Dharma-lite version of this). “I’m going to give up dressing normally. I’m going to wear red strings (protection cords) around my neck, and the mala (the rosary of beads) around my hand, and somehow, this will help me get rid of negative karma, help me to overcome my disturbing emotions and bring me liberation. I will be holy.”
Participant: But you can relate to different objects in different ways.
Dr. Berzin: Yes. There is nothing wrong with wearing a rosary or wearing a red string. That’s not the point. The point is the disturbing outlook toward it.
Participant: So, one has to think it liberates one.
Dr. Berzin: Yeah, if you think that it liberates, it’s necessarily with a disturbing outlook. You are applying incorrect consideration. There’s incorrect consideration there: “This is the path to liberation. This is going to somehow purify me of negative karma.” Bathing in the Ganga – the Buddhists always use that as an example.
Participant: Isn’t it about going to extremes in relation to the object?
Dr. Berzin: Right. All of these are about being extreme. That’s why I said, it’s based on an extreme outlook (thinking that “This is fantastic. It’s going to last forever” or whatever) or a deluded outlook toward the transitory network (identifying “me” with my behavior, my dress, or my diet), and thinking that my conduct is going to purify me of everything. So, there is a lot of incorrect consideration going on there.
But what you point out is very important – that following a course of conduct, as long as it is not a destructive, is not destructive conduct. It’s not like Angulimala, the famous example from Buddhism, the guy that went around and murdered people to chop off their thumbs and wear a rosary of thumbs around his neck because if he got a thousand, then he would be liberated. We are not talking about that kind of behavior. There is a famous story about that. Buddha taught him and convinced him, after he had done nine hundred and ninety-nine of these, that this was not the way! But, you know, there are people who do vengeance killing. “You offended my sister, so I’ll kill you, and that will purify all the negativity.”
Participant: Honor killing.
Dr. Berzin: Honor killing. So, we are not talking about that. But if the conduct is something that is neutral, like standing on one foot, or even something that is positive, like making an offering… Well, I don’t know. Just lighting the incense, by itself, is neutral. You can also light a match, and it’s neutral, isn’t it? It’s making the offering that’s positive.
Participant: If you light the incense because of the smell…
Dr. Berzin: If you light an incense because it has nice smell or you keep the mosquitoes away, then it’s a neutral act.
Participant: Nice smell, again, is about some kind of consideration.
Dr. Berzin: Well, it’s not only a consideration. It is also a ripening of karma, actually. Why do some people like this kind of smell and not that kind of smell, or this kind of food and not that kind of food? That’s a result of karma – namely, a result of building up the tendency to experience what we like to do, what we experience with pleasure. Incorrect consideration would be thinking, “This is the most fantastic thing in the world, and everybody should like it.” That’s incorrect consideration of something you like. Or coming from former Soviet Union, it’s to think, “If you don’t drink this vodka, you are not my friend.”
Participant: “You don’t respect me.”
Dr. Berzin: “You don’t respect me.” Right. So, drinking the vodka is, with incorrect consideration, a sign that you respect me and that you’re my friend. From a Buddhist point of view, that would be a destructive action – drinking the vodka, getting drunk.
What about Confession/Purification?
Participant: Also, Beichte… I don’t know in English.
Participant: Confession.
Participant: Confession, yes.
Dr. Berzin: Going to confession. Now, that’s a difficult one. Going to confession in a Catholic context – does that purify us? Well, first of all, we have… although I don’t like to call it “confession” in Buddhism, but there is something that is often translated as “confession,” which is openly admitting that we made a mistake or that we did something that was inappropriate, improper, and destructive. Then we feel regret; we promise to try as best as possible not to repeat it; we reaffirm our foundation, what we are trying to do that’s positive in life; and then we do some sort of remedial practice to counterbalance it. That might not be saying “Hail Mary’s,” but it could be mantras or whatever. So, it’s equivalent. So, we have it in Buddhism. We don’t need a priest to say this to; we can just say that to ourselves while visualizing the Buddhas. There are thirty-five Buddhas that we do this in front of. So, it’s similar.
Then the question is: what is the effect of this? If we regard that as being just enough to actually purify us and, so, think, “I can act as destructively as I want to, just as long as I confess it. Then I’m going to go and do the same thing again because I can confess it and be….” Well, we don’t have the concept of forgiveness in Buddhism; there isn’t somebody who forgives you. But if we think that we’d be purified – that would be deluded. It’s correct that it is possible to confess, to openly admit, and that that does have some purification effect, but it’s not going to eliminate completely all the negative karma and disturbing emotions and liberate me from samsara. In other words, it’s not enough.
The same thing is true about just saying prayers. His Holiness says this all the time: saying prayers and reciting mantras is not enough. Doing rituals is not enough. These things are positive, but unless you actually study and learn the teachings, unless you think about them, apply them, work on overcoming your anger, selfishness, greed and so on… You’re not going to gain liberation by just mumbling a prayer.
So, there are many different ways in which we can understand this deluded outlook. It seeks and latches onto either the “me” or some member of the transitory network on which the accompanying conceptual cognition is imputing the interpolated conceptual framework. So, it would regard our doing this type of practice or that kind of diet or whatever with the view, or outlook, that it is supreme.
OK, let’s think about it. And of course, people could have this in terms of… Well, I don’t know. I’m maybe thinking instead of holding a deluded outlook as supreme, the one where I’m thinking that if I make enough money, I’ll be happy and that this will bring me ultimate happiness. I don’t know. We also have this in holding a deluded morality or conduct as supreme. There’s the thing we have in some philosophies – that experiencing the perfect orgasm is going to bring us liberation. There are certain practices that are oriented in that direction. That also would be quite deluded.
Participant: Also culturally.
Dr. Berzin: Also culturally?
Participant: That’s not thinking about spiritual liberation but psychological liberation, I’d say.
Dr. Berzin: Right, psychological liberation.
So, I think there is a difference here between looking at these things as supreme and looking at them as bringing liberation. That’s why, perhaps, we have two different deluded outlooks here.
Anyway, it would be helpful to spend a few moments to just examine within ourselves, “Do we have this outlook at all?”
[meditation]
There are two aspects here: ridding ourselves of something that is ultimately trivial to get rid of and adopting something that is ultimately trivial to adopt or to do.
[meditation]
And, basically, overestimating the effect of it, the positive effect of it.
[meditation]
OK. Are you able to come up with any examples? I couldn’t really, in terms of the full definition of this disturbing outlook because it seems as though to have this disturbing outlook in a definitional way, you have to really think that it is possible to get rid of all disturbing emotions and all negative karma and that it is possible to gain liberation from samsara by using an incorrect manner of doing it, a manner that doesn’t work. So, if you don’t have the conceptual framework of aiming for liberation and that type of total purification, I don’t think you would have this disturbing outlook in its definitional form. I think we could have things that are similar to it, but not quite the full thing.
Participant: Maybe some overestimation of some…
Dr. Berzin: It’s an overestimation of a certain type of conduct.
Participant: But in a way, it is correct to think, “Oh, I’m going around the stupa. It doesn’t bring liberation, but it has a certain positive effect.” I think it has some value.
Dr. Berzin: Right. We might not think that just circumambulating is going to bring us liberation, but it certainly has some positive effect. So, if we overestimate these things and basically think that that’s enough (although it doesn’t say that here), this would be an example.
I was thinking of the example in myself – that I have to go to sleep early and have to get up early – so, giving up staying up late and adopting going to sleep early and adopting getting up early – because, otherwise, I’ll be dull-minded and grouchy, and I won’t be able to think clearly and do a lot of work. So, somehow that’s going to liberate me. So, the result of that would be becoming inflexible. Mind you, I don’t hold onto it that tightly, but it is my custom. But I think that could fall into this category. There are certain habits that we have that we are very stuck to, and we really overestimate what they’ll do.
What do you think?
Participant: I think it’s important to relax.
Dr. Berzin: It’s important to relax, yes. It’s important to relax and be flexible. That’s very important. But flexible within certain limits, of course, of what is reasonable.
Participant: We could, for example, have a certain way of life. For example, if I wake up in the morning, and it helps me to go through my daily life…
Dr. Berzin: Right. So, if we have a daily schedule of how much sleep we take, etc…
Participant: It’s like emotional support. It will support you.
Dr. Berzin: Right. It will give us emotional support. We have stability and so on. It will help us to sustain our lives and so on. But do we regard that as freeing us from disturbing emotions and negative karma and bringing liberation? I don’t think so. Having a routine and being flexible with that routine certainly is helpful for most people but not everybody. Certainly, it’s better for health to have regular meals, regular hours, regular sleep pattern. That certainly is beneficial for the health.
A Distorted Outlook
OK, I’d like to do the last one as well today, a distorted outlook.
- A distorted outlook regards an actual cause, an actual effect, an actual functioning, or an existent phenomenon as not being actual or existent.
This, by the way, is sometimes translated as “wrong views,” which is not a very helpful way of describing it, I think. Also, we have to remember that this is the same word in Tibetan (log-lta) that’s used for the destructive action of thinking with a distorted, antagonistic attitude, one of the three destructive actions of mind. But here, we are talking about a deluded outlook. When we are talking about karma and destructive behavior, we are talking about the action of thinking with a distorted attitude. The deluded outlook is something different. Obviously, they go together, but they’re different. So, here we are talking about the attitude, the outlook, being distorted.
So, this outlook looks at an actual cause, an actual effect, an actual functioning (what something does), or something that actually exists, with the attitude of denial. The technical term is “repudiation.” It repudiates, for example, the fact that constructive behavior results in happiness and that destructive behavior results in unhappiness. So, we repudiate that; we deny it. Again, we are not talking about thinking with distorted antagonism, “How am I going to refute it?” That’s the disturbing mental action – thinking out and plotting how we’re going to do it. Here, it’s just the mental attitude of “No such thing.” It could be denying the fact of past and future lives. It could be denying the fact that the attainment of liberation and enlightenment exists. (They’re always defining it in terms of the so-called truths in Buddhism.)
But think about that. Do we have that? And maybe we can extend it to things beyond Buddhism.
Discussion
Participant: I am not a hundred percent sure about future and….
Dr. Berzin: right. I am not a hundred percent sure about past and future lives. Well, that’s indecisive wavering. Here, it’s the outlook of “there is no such thing” – for instance, that there is any value in being positive.
Participant: Alcoholism
Dr. Berzin: Alcoholism. Well, alcoholism is a very good example of the previous one that we were just talking about. “If I take alcohol, if I take heroin, if I take this drug or that drug, it will eliminate my disturbing emotions. I’ll be so happy. It’ll get rid of my negative karma and liberate me.” That’s good example of that one.
Participant: And in this case?
Dr. Berzin: In this case, it would be that to deny that it’s a cause of problems, that alcoholism is a cause of problems, that it brings suffering.
Participant: There is an aspect of denial in alcoholism.
Dr. Berzin: There is an aspect of denial in alcoholism, sure. There are a lot of things that actually could fit in here. How about denial of Buddha-nature? “I am no good. I can never accomplish anything. It’s impossible for me to make any progress.” How about just a simple one like, “Nobody loves me,” which means my mother never loved me, my dog doesn’t love me, nobody ever loved me. “I’m unlovable.” Do you ever have that?
Or you get fed up with your spiritual practice and you say, “This is useless.” We’re not talking about saying it; we’re talking about the attitude, which is based on an incorrect consideration.
How Do We Know What Is True and What Is Distorted? Is It Just a Matter of Belief?
Of course, this becomes tricky. There can be certain philosophical or religious beliefs that, as a Buddhist, we might deny, but that others think are true. (We won’t give examples since it might offend somebody.) So, that’s tricky. What’s true? Believers in other systems will think that their beliefs are true, of course. Buddhism is always saying everything has to be subject to reason and logic, whereas there are other systems that say that there are certain truths that are beyond reason and logic. So, here we have no basis for debate. Shantideva pointed that out: in order to have a debate, you have to have a common ground; you both have to agree on the basic rules. If one of the basic rules is that everything has to be logical and reasonable and the other party doesn’t accept that, you can’t have a debate.
Participant: Just reasonable and logical? Also empirical. Empirical valuation.
Dr. Berzin: Also empirical validation, sure. Not just logic in Buddhism.
Participant: It’s also related to rhetoric. And with rhetoric, you just build logic, which doesn’t have to have anything to do with the reality.
Dr. Berzin: Well, yes. She’s saying that with rhetoric, you can also build a system of logic that might not necessarily have anything to do with reality… just because it’s logical. That’s true. So, even logic has its limitations.
All of this becomes very tricky. In the end, does it just come down to belief ? Well, I don’t know. Buddhism would basically say to look at a result. With this set of beliefs, what is the result? What always has to be pointed out (the classic example) is that if you pray to go to a Christian heaven, you’re going to end up in a Christian heaven; you’re not going to end up in a Buddhist heaven. And if you pray to go to a Buddhist heaven, you’re not going to end up in a Christian heaven. That’s a silly example, but it’s very good example. There is no reason to assume that following the practices of another religion or another philosophy is going to bring about the goal of Buddhism. If they bring about their own stated goals, then it’s perfectly valid for bringing about the goal that they say they’re going to bring about. Do these other systems say that they will bring about removal of all disturbing emotions or not?
Now, what does Buddhism say about certain practices? If they say that this practice is going to bring about… This is the interesting point. The Buddhist classical position is that Buddha taught a way to overcome uncontrollably recurring rebirth. Some of the non-Buddhist Indian systems that had very sophisticated methods for attaining very, very deep meditative states of absorption thought that those meditative states brought them liberation. Why? Because as a result of their attachment to these deep states of meditative absorption, they were reborn as form or formless gods who have enormously, enormously long lifetimes. So, because they lacked the advanced awareness, the ESP, to see many, many lifetimes in the future to see that that rebirth in these god realms would eventually end, they thought that they had attained liberation. Buddha, who is able to see beginningless past and future rebirths, saw that that was not actually liberation, that after a zillion years, their rebirth in the form or formless god realms was going to end. I think it’s even in one of the secondary bodhisattva vows not to view these absorptions as a path to liberation. It can get you an enormously long life in sort of a limbo… not a limbo, but a state in which, basically, your mind is blank, just absorbed in the infinity of the mind or the infinity of space, or in nothingness – these sorts of things. That is not liberation.
So, the wrong view is when you think that this is going to bring Buddhist liberation. If you say it’s just going to bring you a rebirth in one of these form or formless realms, fine, because it does.
Participant: But I think, for instance, life as a Christian monk or nun who spends days in prayer and caring for others has enormous benefit.
Dr. Berzin: Right. Nobody is denying that. She says that a Christian monk or nun who devotes themselves to good works and helping others has great benefit. Yes, of course, it has great benefit. And what is the goal in Christianity that you would achieve from that? It’s going to heaven. Buddhism wouldn’t deny that. We’d never deny that. They pray to be reborn in a Christian heaven, and they will be reborn in a Christian heaven. Perfect. Nothing incorrect about that. But to think that by doing that and praying to go to a Christian heaven they are going to gain liberation and enlightenment as defined in Buddhism would be incorrect. They’re not aiming for that, so why would they reach it?
I don’t think this is being disrespectful at all to other religions. I think it is more disrespectful to other religions to say that by following their path, they are going to reach our goal. That’s called the inclusivist form, which says, “Well, your path is really just part of our path.” It’s not respecting the other.
Participant: But enlightenment, I thought, didn’t have to come just from Buddhist practice. I thought that it could happen to anybody who believed in something higher.
Dr. Berzin: She’s basically saying, can’t everybody reach enlightenment?
Participant: Or liberation.
Dr. Berzin: Or liberation. Yes, definitely, everybody can reach it. But in order to reach it, you need to overcome the causes of uncontrollably recurring rebirth, the causes of the lack of enlightenment and so on.
Participant: Which way ever?
Liberation and Enlightenment Are Possible Only by Building Up the Two Networks and Having an Understanding of Reality That Would Accord with Buddha’s
Dr. Berzin: Which way ever? There are two things that you need, two basic building blocks that you need. They’re called the “two networks,” or the “two collections.” You have to build up a tremendous amount of positive force by being constructive, not acting destructively. That you can do by doing any type of practice in any religion. But this network of deep awareness, the correct understanding of reality – that would need to be the way that it is understood by Buddha. And Buddha taught, of course, many different descriptions of this, many different levels of this. And every Buddhist school and tenet system would say that it brings you liberation, and some of them say it brings enlightenment, etc. So, again, one has to examine more deeply. But without actually going to the root of the problem, you are not going to get rid of it.
With a partial understanding, with incorrect understanding or with no understanding, the positive force from all the good works that you do is not enough. But it will bring you better rebirths. Likewise, just having the correct understanding is not going to bring you liberation and enlightenment either. You need to have the positive force behind it (so-called good karma, “merit”). So, you need the combination of the two. But everybody has the ability to become liberated and enlightened. Everybody has the ability to go to heaven, Christian heaven. Why not?
Just one more thing.
Tsongkhapa says that this distorted outlook could not only accompany a repudiation, or denial, of something. It could also regard a false cause, a false effect, a false functioning, or a nonexistent phenomenon as true or existent. In other words, it could also be accompanied by an interpolation (adding something that is not there) – for example, that primal matter is a cause or creator of limited beings (that’s the Samkhya point of view). That would be like saying that the Big Bang is the cause of living beings, of mind, of mental activity – just this physical primal matter type of thing. It’s not the primal matter of the Samkhyas, but it’s analogous in terms of our Western way of thinking.
Participant: What would be, then, when one has the position of “I don’t know”?
Dr. Berzin: If we had the position of, “I don’t know”? It may be that we don’t know. That’s unawareness, naivety. We just don’t know. If we admit that we don’t know, we’re at least not fooling ourselves into thinking that we do know. “Maybe this; maybe that” – that’s indecisive wavering.
Participant: Yeah. But to know, for instance, what happened at the Big Bang… who knows it?
Dr. Berzin: Right. What happened at the Big Bang? “I don’t know.” What happens after death? “I don’t know.”
Participant: Yes.
Dr. Berzin: Well, that’s simply “I don’t know.” On the basis of “I don’t know,” it could be “maybe it’s this; maybe it’s that.” So, you are guessing. Or you could make no guess: “I just don’t know.” So, underlying indecisive wavering is also not knowing, being unaware.
That’s part of the whole way of getting rid of the disturbing emotions. Unawareness, not knowing, is one of them. Calling it an emotion is not a very good word for it, but it’s hard to find… It’s a disturbing state of mind. But the first thing that you have to identify is what the problems are. So, just to admit that you don’t know is a big first step. What would follow from that is “I would like to know.” That would be the constructive step that would follow. “I would like to know. How can I find out?” That could lead you to a spiritual path or to Google… something like that.