LTF 20: 4 Types of Discriminating Awareness; the 2 Truths (Verses 12 – 14)

In one of the verses that we discussed last time, there was a question that arose regarding the six far-reaching attitudes, and someone asked about the four further ones. I was ashamed to say that I didn’t have the definitions at my fingertips, but I now have them with me. 

The last four are basically subdivisions of the sixth one, which is far-reaching discriminating awareness, or the perfection of wisdom. In other words, they are special types of discriminating awareness. 

Skillful Means

First is being skillful means (thabs-mkhas, Skt. upayakausalya). It’s defined as “the special discriminating awareness concerning the most effective and appropriate internal methods for actualizing the Buddhist teachings and the most effective and appropriate external methods for ripening limited beings.” In other words, this consists of methods for making beings ripe for attaining liberation and enlightenment. It’s the discriminating awareness with which you know what the best methods for actualizing the teachings yourself are and what the best methods for helping others to reach liberation and enlightenment are. 

Aspirational Prayer

The eighth far-reaching attitude is “aspirational prayer” (smon-lam, Skt. pranidhana). This is an aspiration never to be parted from a bodhichitta aim in all your lifetimes and for the continuity of the far-reaching activities – namely, bodhisattva activities – for benefiting all beings never to be broken. It’s called “special discriminating awareness” because it is a discriminating awareness concerning phenomena toward which to aspire – what you wish to attain and make efforts to attain. In other words, you discriminate what the best thing to aim for in life would be. 

Strengthening

The ninth far-reaching attitude is “strengthening” (stobs, Skt. bala). Sometimes that’s translated as “strength,” but actually it means “strengthening,” if you look at the definition. It is the special discriminating awareness that you use for expanding your discriminating awareness and not letting it be crushed by countering factors, such as attachment to anything. So, you discriminate how to ensure that your discriminating awareness itself isn’t going to be overcome by attachment and so on; it strengthens and makes it stronger and stronger. There are two types: there is a far-reaching strengthening through thorough analysis – so, it's an analytical type of meditation; and a far-reaching strengthening through stabilizing meditation – so, a meditation in which you stabilize this strengthening of your understanding.

Deep Awareness (of Voidness)

The last one is “far-reaching deep awareness” (shes-rab-kyi pha-rol-tu phyin-pa, Skt. prajnaparamita) The exact definition of this is, “a special discriminating awareness employed for having the defining characteristic of all phenomena as voidness.” In other words, it’s the discriminating awareness with which the characteristic of voidness becomes fully integrated with your mind. When voidness becomes so totally familiar and integrated with the mind, bodhisattvas can gain simultaneous and equal awareness of the two truths about everything, both the superficial, or conventional, truth and the deepest truth. Only as a Buddha can you have the two truths simultaneously manifest in your explicit understanding of things. This is the deep awareness that comes just before the step where you integrate voidness so well that you are able to get the two truths simultaneously with Buddhahood.

Participant: So, they do not see them simultaneously yet.

Dr Berzin: No. You can only see them simultaneously as a Buddha. This is what is usually perfected, so-called perfected, on the tenth bhumi. With each of the ten bhumis, there is a special emphasis, successively, on each of the ten far-reaching attitudes. These are the bodhisattva levels of mind that start with the seeing pathway mind, or path of seeing, and continue through the path of meditation, which I call an accustoming pathway mind, where you get accustomed to non-conceptual cognition of voidness. 

According to the non-Gelugpa schools, bodhisattvas do have, before Buddhahood, the awareness of the two truths from the path of seeing onwards but not in equal strength and not with equal attention. It’s only as a Buddha that you get them with equal attention. So, there’s a different way of explaining it there. 

So, that fills in what we didn't have last time. Is that OK, Carson? You’re the one who asked about it. Alles klar? 

Participant: Yeah. So far as I can understand it.

Dr Berzin: This one with deep awareness – basically, you are practicing seeing absolutely everything in every moment of your life as void of true existence. By doing this, you integrate it so fully that, eventually, at the conclusion of this stage, you are able to see the two truths simultaneously. 

Participant: What do the Gelugpas say? To me, it sounds quite logical to say that up to the first bhumi, you’ve always had some recognition of voidness. So, what would the Gelug school say?

Dr Berzin: You see the problem here is that there are different explanations of cognition in the Gelugpa and non-Gelugpa schools. According to the Gelugpas, the mind makes an appearance of true existence all of the time except for when one is totally absorbed on voidness non-conceptually. So, even with non-conceptual perception of seeing and so on, the mind still makes an appearance of true existence, and with conceptual cognition, there is always an appearance of true existence. Because of that, you can’t have the simultaneous cognition of an absence of true existence and an appearance of true existence; you can only have one at a time. The only way to cognize the two truths simultaneously, is to cognize the voidness of the two truths simultaneously. The two truths are the conventional truth of all conventional phenomena and the voidness this the voidness of the omniscient mind cognizing them. With such cognition, the mind is focused only on the voidness of the two as having the same essential nature, but because the bases of the two voidnesses are different, they can be conceptually specified as different. 

Just this cognition is not enough; you also need to be able to cognize this voidness together with the dependent arising of all phenomena as mere conventionalities and not as conventional truths. Mere conventionalities do not appear with true existence, whereas conventional truths do. The only mind that is capable of doing that is the clear light subtlest mind because it doesn’t make appearances of true existence. Gelugpas say that, even if you’ve been following the sutra path, on the final stage of the tenth bhumi, you have to switch to anuttarayoga tantra because you have to get to the clear light mind in order to get this attainment. 

Explicit and Implicit Apprehension

Before the attainment of enlightenment, Gelugpas say that you can have both explicit and implicit apprehension of objects, including voidness. With enlightenment, there is no implicit apprehension. “Apprehension” is a correct and decisive understanding. “Explicit” means that the object appears. “Implicit” is that the object doesn’t appear. “Appear” means that an aspect of it, like a mental hologram, arises in the cognition.

Participant: You can have implicit and explicit…

Dr Berzin: Valid cognition has both explicit and implicit apprehension of the object. Can have both, I should say. It doesn’t necessarily have both. 

Participant: And apprehension?

Dr Berzin: “Apprehension” means “accurate and decisive understanding.” I forget what word we used for that in German.

Participant: Verständnis?

Dr Berzin: Well, you can use Verständnis. But Verständnis isn’t quite the correct word. Apprehension means “accurate and decisive” – not just accurate but also decisive. “Decisive” means that it knows that the object is this and not that. 

Participant: So, all valid minds have this apprehension?

Dr Berzin: Well, all valid minds can apprehend their objects, but not all minds that apprehend their objects are valid minds; it depends on what system we’re using. In Sautrantika, valid means fresh and nonfraudulent, and nonfraudulent means that it apprehends its object. Sautrantika asserts a way of knowing called “subsequent cognition.” It’s apprehends its object and so it’s nonfraudulent, but it’s not valid because it is not fresh: it’s a subsequent cognition – after the first moment of validly cognizing something, from the second moment on, if you still cognize the same object, it is subsequent cognition and is no longer fresh. 

In any case, the point is that with explicit apprehension there is something that appears and with implicit apprehension something that doesn’t appear. I’ll give an example. I see that this is a table; I understand that this is a table. When I explicitly understand that this is a table – because the table appears – implicitly I know that it’s not a dog, it’s not a chair, it’s not anything else. “Not a dog” doesn’t appear, but I know that it’s not a dog, I know that it’s not a chair when I see decisively that it’s a table. Another example is when you explicitly apprehend that the fat man does not eat during the day, you implicitly apprehend that he eats at night, because he is fat. Only the Gelugpas assert implicit apprehension.. 

Now, when you are totally absorbed non-conceptually on voidness, you only have voidness explicitly appearing. This is because voidness is a non-implicative negation that once the sound of the words expressing it – “no such thing as the true existence of the table” – have cut off the object of negation – “the true existence of the table” – it only “tosses into its footprint” the negation phenomenon – “no such thing as the true existence of the table.” It does not toss any affirmation phenomenon, such as the table. You explicitly apprehend “no such thing as the true existence of the table” and do not implicitly apprehend anything.   

Do you follow? So, in the non-conceptual total absorption of voidness, you only have explicit understanding of voidness; you don’t apprehend the basis even implicitly. 

Now, what follows immediately after that non-conceptual total absorption on voidness is the non-conceptual subsequent attainment – what you subsequently attain. You explicitly apprehend the basis of the voidness – the table; it appears with true existence. Implicitly, you apprehend its voidness – that it’s like an illusion because there is no such thing as true existence. This phase is usually called “post meditation,” but that’s not a very good translation. Actually, it’s after total absorption, not after meditation, because you’re still meditating. 

What a Buddha can do, which nobody but a Buddha can do, is to have voidness and its basis together simultaneously and to have both be explicit. Both can only be explicit if they’re perceived with a mind of clear light. A mind of clear light doesn’t make any appearance of true existence. A mind of clear light can make an appearance of the table explicitly without making it appear to be truly existent. Any level below a Buddha’s would make it appear truly existent. 

So, that’s a bit of a technical explanation, but it’s a very curious, a very interesting point why the Gelugpas say this and why, even in the subsequent attainment, it doesn’t count that you can get voidness implicit and the superficial appearance explicit. Why is that not enough to count as a Buddha seeing the two truths simultaneously?

Now, the non-Gelugpa schools – first of all, they don’t accept that there is implicit apprehension. Everything has to be explicit. They also say that in non-conceptual cognition, the mind does not make an appearance of true existence; it only makes appearance of true existence in conceptual cognition. You have to then change everything in your understanding by taking those two points into consideration because it affects everything else in the system. It would be very nice if you could have a computer mind and could just replace and make all the changes. It’s not so easy to figure out by yourself. But the result of this view is that in an arya’s absorption on voidness, they can have the two truths appearing simultaneously because both can only be explicit. However, in the total absorption, the attention on the superficial truth appearance is very weak. Also in the subsequent attainment, the attention on voidness is very, very weak. As you go through the bhumis, they sort of balance out, and, eventually, as a Buddha, they are equally clear. 

The main thing that this all fits in with in the non-Gelugpa explanation is their big, big emphasis on the inseparability of the two truths – the inseparability of voidness and appearance. Then, because they are inseparable, they find it totally unacceptable that an arya sees only one at a time. An arya has to have the two truths inseparable – voidness and appearance. That, for the non-Gelugpas, is really the deepest truth. For them, conventional truth is just appearance by itself. Deepest truth is appearance and voidness as inseparable – in other words, inseparable two truths. 

When it comes to Svabhavakaya, the Nature Body of a Buddha, the Gelugpas say that it is just the voidness of the mind of a Buddha, whereas the non-Gelugpas say that it’s the inseparability of the Three Bodies of a Buddha, which means the inseparability of mind and voidness on the one side and appearance on the other side – so, the inseparability of the two truths. For both the Gelugpas and the non-Gelugpas, Svabhavakaya is the deepest truth of the mind of a Buddha. But for one, it’s only voidness, and for the other, it’s voidness plus the appearance of Nirmanakaya and Sambhogakaya – so, everything fits together. Within each system, it’s consistent, but you have to get the correct pieces to put into that puzzle of that system. If you put in a piece from another puzzle – from the Gelugpa puzzle – it doesn’t work.

We are up to Verse 12. In Mipam’s outline, which seems to make the most sense to me, he divides the big section that follows into the six far-reaching attitudes. We have covered generosity, and now we are on ethical discipline. If you remember, Verses 10 and 11 discuss the discipline to get rid of improper conduct. This was following the eight vows of the eight one-day precepts. 

Verse 12 is about the discipline to get rid of improper attitudes. The verse reads:

[12] View as enemies stinginess, guile, pretense, attachment, lethargy, false pride, lust, hatred, and conceit over greatness of caste, physique, education, youth, or power. 

Participant: What is guile?

Dr Berzin: Guile is when you hide your negative qualities. 

This is a big, long list of disturbing emotions. I think we are familiar with most of them, but I’ll give just a few comments on each according to the commentaries: 

Stinginess is not being willing to share what you have – holding on to it. Guile is hiding your negative qualities. Pretense is to pretend that you have good qualities when you don’t have them. Attachment, the commentary says, mostly refers to one’s body and wealth. Lethargy is not having any zeal or enthusiastic energy for doing anything constructive. False pride is pride about things that you haven’t actually attained; you pretend that you have attained something and you feel very proud about it, but you actually haven’t achieved it – like being a great yogi when you are not; you’re just wearing a costume and have your hair tied up. Lust is explained as specifically for sex. Hatred is hating anybody. Then conceit over greatness of caste (which would be quite the case in India); physique – how strong you are; your education; youth; or power – like in the case of a king. Verse 12 says to “view as enemies” these negative qualities because they steal the life of doing anything constructive. 

Then the next verse, Verse 13, is speaking about what we need to develop as a support for ethical discipline. The verse reads:

[13] The Sage has proclaimed that caring is the (mental) stand for the nectar (of immortality), while not caring is the stand for death. Therefore, to boost your constructive Dharma measures, you need to have a caring attitude, always, through being appreciative.

The “caring attitude”  – we always had a lot of difficulty translating this term. The way it is explained in the commentary here (this is the Gelugpa one that I have the actual Tibetan for) is that it means caring in general. We always explain it as caring about the consequences of your actions, to take that seriously. What that implies, according to the commentary, is to be careful to refrain from destructive actions because you have mindfulness, alertness, ethical self-dignity, and you care about how your actions affect others – these four qualities. So, because you care about the consequences, you take care not to act destructively by using all of these factors, which Shantideva explained, actually, in his chapter called, “The Caring Attitude.” You have to be mindful, alert, and so on. 

Participant: So, it’s not necessarily caring as in caring for someone.

Dr Berzin: Not really caring for someone. You take seriously the results, the effect of your behavior, and because of that, you are careful to restrain yourself, careful not to do anything destructive. 

Participant: So, caring is like being careful.

Dr Berzin: Right. So, it has the two meanings. 

Participant: But it’s not talking about love and compassion here…

Dr Berzin: No, no, not at all. I care about the effect. I take it seriously. “I don’t care what happens” – that’s the opposite of it. “Doesn’t matter to me. Es ist egal – it’s equal.” Right, Vorsicht, also.

This is the mental stand, in other words, the basis that you stand on for the nectar of immortality. The nectar of immortality refers to liberation. With liberation, you are free from samsaric death; therefore, it’s called the “nectar of immortality.” Alright? So, a caring attitude is the stand for that. It’s the basis that you stand on in order to get liberation, the mental basis that you stand on. 

The opposite of that is not caring. In other words, you don’t care what happens, so you don’t take care; you are not careful about how you act. That’s the stand, the mental stand, for death. This is the opposite of immortality. It’s referring to experiencing samsaric rebirth and death over and over again.

“Therefore,” it says, “to boost your constructive Dharma measures.” That means to give rise to what you haven't developed before and to increase what you already have developed. And “for that, you need the caring attitude, always, through being appreciative.” “Appreciative” is usually translated as “respect,” but if you look at how it is actually used in the teachings on entrusting yourself to the spiritual teacher, it’s the word that’s used in connection with the kindness of the guru. You don’t respect the kindness of the guru: you appreciate it. So, here, one appreciates the good qualities and the kindness of the Buddha who taught about cause and effect and so on. It has, in this context, a little bit the meaning of respect, but also appreciation – that “I really appreciate that Buddha taught this, and so I’m going to follow it.” 

Then Verse 14 is… well, maybe it would be nice to first read the verse that we just did again so that it hangs together.

[13] The Sage has proclaimed that caring is the (mental) stand for the nectar (of immortality), while not caring is the stand for death. Therefore, to boost your constructive Dharma measures, you need to have a caring attitude, always, through being appreciative.

I think it’s very nice to see here that Nagarjuna is one of the sources of Shantideva’s presentation. If you remember, Shantideva had two chapters on ethical discipline, and the first one was on this caring attitude. It comes quite clearly, here, in Nagarjuna’s Letter to a Friend that the caring attitude is the most essential aspect of ethical discipline. You have to care about what’s going to happen to you, to take it seriously, and then to be very careful to apply mindfulness and alertness to hold onto the discipline and to watch for when you are going astray and, if so, to stop – be like a block of wood. Remember that chapter with all those examples of when to be like a block of wood – just not do it when you are about to do something negative. 

OK. Verse 14, the benefits of ethical discipline:

[14] Anyone who previously didn’t care, and later develops a caring attitude, becomes as beautiful as the moon when parted from clouds, like Nanda, Angulimala, Ajatashatru, and Udayana.

Those are four examples. Now we get stories. There are many examples of people who didn’t take care about their actions but then repented and developed a caring attitude and then achieved all sorts of very, very high attainments. 

Nanda is our first example. Nanda was a cousin of Buddha who was completely attached to his wife; he couldn’t bear to be out of her company. If she had to go out of the room, he would put a little dab of her saliva on his forehead, and she’d have to return before it dried up. Everybody was completely disgusted with Nanda, but the Buddha was undaunted; he wasn’t discouraged by Nanda’s unbelievable attachment. To tame his cousin, Buddha transported Nanda to one of the god realms and showed him celestial maidens so beautiful that his wife looked repulsive by comparison. Nanda got very, very excited and wanted to know how he could get one of these beautiful celestial maidens for himself. But then Buddha took him to one of the hell realms and showed him some horrible, gruesome torturers, which terrified Nanda. Buddha told him that this was the type of rebirth that awaits those who are overwhelmed with desire for women. In this way, Buddha was able to tame Nanda of his attachment and lead him to liberation. This is an example of somebody who had unbelievable attachment, who then took care, and was tamed by Buddha.

Then we have the example of Angulimala, who was overwhelmed with anger. Once, there was a very strong man called Angulimala, who entrusted himself to a misleading teacher. This devious master cast a spell on him that caused him always to be furiously angry. He told Angulimala that if he murdered 1,000 people and strung a garland of one thumb from each of his victims, this would lead to his liberation. Angulimala had already collected 999 thumbs, and was about to kill his own mother to complete the thousand, when he met the Buddha, who appeared as a simple monk. The Buddha told him not to murder his mother but to come back tomorrow and take him instead. The next day, Angulimala returned and met the Buddha who was walking on the road. The Buddha was strolling at a very leisurely pace, but Angulimala could never catch up with the Buddha no matter how fast he ran. Eventually, after a long distance, Angulimala’s strength and anger finally got less and less and he called to the Buddha, “Please stop and sit down.” Buddha replied, “I am always sitting, but you never sit still one moment since you were led astray by this misleading teacher.” Angulimala asked, “How is it that you are always sitting?” Buddha said, “Because I have tamed the power of my mind and my senses. So, I am always sitting.” In this way, Buddha was able to lead this murderer to a state of liberation. 

Then, our third example is Ajatashatru. Ajatashatru was the son of King Bimbisara. Bimbisara was the king of… was it Magadha? No, he ruled the kingdom by Rajgir. What was that kingdom called? Anyway, King Bimbisara was a great patron of the Buddha, and Buddha taught a great deal in his land, which was around where Vulture’s Peak is. The son of Ajatashatru was a great friend of Devadatta, the cousin of the Buddha. They plotted together that Ajatashatru would kill his father, Bimbisara, and become the king, and Devedatta would kill Buddha and take over and lead the new sangha. Later, however, Ajatashatru developed great faith in the Buddha (I don't have the complete story here; I just have what’s in this book), and he was able to purify himself of these negative thoughts and negative acts. Eventually, the Buddha declared him to be the most faithful of all the upasakas, the lay people keeping the five vows. Actually, Ajatashatru had killed his father, Bimbisara. Devadatta never succeeded in harming the Buddha, but Ajatashatru had killed his father. So, this is an example of someone who had even killed their own father and regretted that and then took care about discipline and was able to achieve a high attainment.

Participant: What level did he attain? 

Dr Berzin: It doesn’t say that here. I think he achieved the non-returner state or something like that. No, actually, it was Bimbisara who was a non-returner. Anyway, he achieved a high level.  

The last example is Udayana. In some texts, he is also called Shankara. He’s an example of somebody who killed his mother. Udayana was a monk, a Buddhist monk, but he wanted to have sex with another man’s wife, and his mother prevented it. He got so angry with his mother that he killed her. Because he had committed such a terrible crime, he was kicked out of the monastery; he was banished by the sangha. So, he went and settled in a remote area, where he built a temple. Eventually, a large number of Buddhist monks took up residence there, and Udayana served as the elder. He said that he was still a monk; it’s just that he was kicked out of the monastery. After his death, Udayana was born immediately in a hell realm as the consequence of killing his mother. But because he had supported all of these monks, had built a temple and so on, he remained in hell only a very short time and quickly escaped, like in the manner of a bouncing ball. 

Participant: So, he was acting as the abbot of that monastery?

Dr Berzin: Right. He built a temple, a monastery, and supported the monks and acted as the abbot. So, for killing his mother, he went into hell because this is one of the types of negative actions that causes you to immediately go to the worst hell in your next rebirth. But because he had supported the monks and the sangha so much after killing his mother, he was just like a bouncing ball in the hell. He came out very quickly. Then he was reborn in one of the god realms immediately afterwards, and eventually, he attained the level of a stream-enterer. 

So, these are examples. And although you might find them a little bit strange and hard to take literally, I think that one has to appreciate the value of teaching through stories. It’s not necessary to take the stories literally, but they do teach us a lesson. 

I remember when I was translating for Serkong Rinpoche, he told some stories about karma were really quite amazing. There was one man who had an elephant that used to shit gold. He always wanted to get rid of this elephant because he was constantly bothered by people wanting the gold droppings of the elephant. When he would chase the elephant away, the elephant would disappear into the ground and then appear again next to him wherever he went. There was a king who was jealous of this and wanted to get the elephant. But, again, whenever he would try to steal the elephant, the elephant would appear back at the side of the man again. So, this is a story to say that if you’ve built up the karmic causes for something, you will experience the results, and nobody else will. 

When I explained these, I explained them as stories – as if the Buddha had made them up as fairy tales to teach people – Serkong Rinpoche scolded me (he always scolded me), saying that I shouldn’t call them stories; I should call them accounts, historical accounts. So, we shouldn’t look down upon these accounts of what happened just because we think that they sound a little bit far-fetched. 

The main thing is to see what we can learn from these accounts. Also, for a lot of people, these are the things that they remember much more easily. You probably will remember these much more easily than you’ll remember my description of the two truths and how they appear in an arya’s meditation. So, actually, it’s quite a skillful method, and many Tibetan teachers are very good at teaching through these stories and accounts. So, it’s important that when we meet a teacher who teaches that way, not to laugh in an arrogant way about it. Serkong Rinpoche was always annoyed by and putting down my arrogance. He never missed an opportunity to show me when I was being arrogant, especially culturally arrogant. So, we have to watch out for that and see what we can learn from this teaching method. 

I think I told you this once. Rinpoche was explaining to me the Tibetan way of doing arithmetic for certain calculations dealing with laying out the land for a Kalachakra mandala. And I said to him in Tibetan, “The way the Tibetans do arithmetic is really very, very strange.” He really scolded me for that. He said, “It’s different; it’s not strange. Don’t be so arrogant.”

So, that’s Verse 14. To repeat:

[14] Anyone who previously didn’t care, and later develops a caring attitude, becomes as beautiful as the moon when parted from clouds, like Nanda, Angulimala, Ajatashatru, and Udayana.

This is emphasizing that no matter how negative we have been, how much we didn’t care about the consequences of our actions, either because we were overwhelmed with desire or hatred – even killing our father or mother – nevertheless, it’s possible to regret that, purify that, and develop this caring attitude. It’s never too late to apply ethical discipline and to achieve great attainments.

I think that that is not only generally good advice but that it is probably quite pointed at the king. It reminds me of the account of King Ashoka. King Ahsoka was this great Dharma king who spread the Dharma very widely. However, before he did that, he engaged in some horrible wars, and through his military campaigns, an awful lot of people got killed. Of course, he regretted this later and became a great Buddhist practitioner and supporter. The consequences of what he did in his life are a little bit reminiscent of this account of Udayana – like the bouncing ball in one of the hells. Ashoka was reborn as a frog in the pond by the palace when he died, and his Buddhist teacher recognized who he was. The frog was about to eat a worm, or maybe it was another kind of insect, and the teacher said, “Ashoka, don’t eat that worm! Don’t kill!” Ashoka, as the frog, still had a strong association with the teacher, so he didn’t eat any insects or worms or anything after that, and he starved to death. So, here, he was taking care, right? He was refraining from negative activity. Then, immediately afterwards he was born in some sort of god realm and achieved all sort of fantastic attainments. I always remember that line, though. “Ashoka, don’t eat that worm!” I always remember that line. I love that line, actually. 

That brings us to the end of the verses on ethical self-discipline, and this is a good place to stop for today. Next week, we’ll go on to the verses dealing with patience. You might even recognize some phrases from these next verses that Shantideva borrowed from Nagarjuna.