…at one time.
The Bhagavan was dwelling on Mass of Vultures Mountain
in Rajagriha together with a great community of monks
and a great community of bodhisattvas.
At that time, the Bhagavan was absorbed in the concentration on the categories of phenomena called “Profound Perception.”
Also, at that time, the bodhisattva mahasattva arya Avalokiteshvara
looked upon the very practice of the profound perfection of wisdom
and beheld those five aggregates also as empty of inherent nature.
Then, through the power of Buddha, the venerable Shariputra said this to the Bodhisattva Mahasattva Arya Avalokiteshvara:
“How should any son of the lineage train or daughter of the lineage train who wishes to practice the activity of the profound perfection of wisdom?”
He said that, and the Bodhisattva Mahasattva Arya Avalokiteshvara said this to the venerable Sharadvati putra.
“Shariputra, any son of the lineage or daughter of the lineage who wishes to practice the activity of the profound perfection of wisdom,
should look upon it like this, correctly and repeatedly beholding
those five aggregates also as empty of inherent nature.
Form is empty. Emptiness is form.
Emptiness is not other than form; form is also not other than emptiness.
In the same way, feeling, discrimination, compositional factors, and consciousness are empty”.
SMALL MEDITATION SESSION
As usual, we will start with a short meditation and then we’ll try to go through the text Heart Sutraand then I’m looking forward to have some questions at the end, because we’ve been through like one or two times. But I have no idea where you are, so looking forward to hear some questions so that I can pretty much understand. So then based on that I can go on in the next class.
And also it is usually a short meditation with motivation would be really nice. These days, even here at my monastery, too many things are going on, the Covid and lot of monks infected inside the monastery, few monks passed away like a lot of things going on. Regardless of how things are, how surroundings are, let’s try to have this class, we can totally be in the text that we are talking and discussing.
So, short meditations can be a sort of reboot or refresh your mind. Clear your mind so that we can go, and today it’s more like to clear my mind. So the motivation of meditation to clear away all of the things, maybe we can go towards the meditation, you want to go to the meditation with the mantra or just meditation on maybe the Heart Sutra or emptiness, that way things exist.
We discussed a bit regarding emptiness last time in the last class, so I want you to think about this, reflect, analyze and try to recall what you have studied or understood in the last class. So if the things are not clear over there in your mind, it’s also good because you’ll get asked later on.
Emptiness is interesting because the more you think the more you understand, it’s not something on surface, but this is really profound, you can think forever pretty much. So let’s dissolve in ourselves.
It’s more like in ancient time in India they used to go to some islands, I don’t know, they say they are going to island to bring the jewels. Maybe that time some seashells are jewels or maybe there is something that I don’t know, they called a jewel or gems, so they go to some places to bring jewels or gem.
Our mind is also a place where you can find all the jewels and gems. All the happiness, love, compassion, patience, all the good qualities exist within our mind, so let’s go inside that mind. Let’s go to the place where all the good things exist, where all the good things can be arisen, all the good things can be achieved, developed. So let’s go to that, to the place where all the goodness exists so that we can literally get, achieve, obtain all the good things. OK, three, two and one .
(meditation within few minutes)
INTRODUCTION
Mind, it’s more like a flower orchard or a flower garden. So when you meditate, it’s more like you are entering into the flower garden, to be realistic, it’s not just flower that exists in a flower garden, there are lot of things that we need to accept, along with the flower, for example, many flowers have the thorns and, oh cactuses have also flowers right? So the cactus or another rose, I don’t know many names, so this flower have the thorns right? In the flower garden which is full of, let’s say, roses, It’s not just flower in that, flower garden is also those thorns on those roses in that flower garden.
So we meditate, it is in our hand whether we focus on those flowers or whether we focus on those thorns. Those people who do research on thorns, maybe when they enter into rose garden all they see is a thorn or everywhere, so we make sure that we enjoy the flowers in the flower garden. So it’s more like when you meditate you should, it’s very important, to contemplate, focus on positive thoughts, can be love, compassion or any other thing, they bring peace and happiness within you which is why when we do the breathing meditation, there are a lot of things that we can concentrate. But the general majority of the Buddhist books and ancient Buddhist books explained about training with the breathing and so forth.
It doesn’t talk about meditating on anger or jealousy, or meditating like if you really like one person or a car or whatever gadgets, whatever it is, it doesn’t talk about meditating on those things. You might concentrate a bit more on that, but then that won’t be helpful because that will just activate, increase your attachment towards that. So that’s why it’s very important to focus more on positivities, to control the object that you are focusing, not to let your mind run towards the thorns, just keep your mind towards flowers at the end of the day. Doesn’t matter where you are, where you are staying, whether you are in a garden or not, you can always be able to see flowers, whether it’s with your eyes or whether it’s with your conceptual thought.
If you try to activate those positive qualities and positive thoughts is always possible, it’s more like you will be able to see a flower whenever you want to see. If you are in a garden, you open your eyes, you see the flowers. If you’re not in a garden, you close your eyes, you can see the flowers, as long as you wish to see, as long as that’s bring peace and happiness, then there is always a chance to see that.
In fact, the great practitioners, even in the worst situation, they rejoice, they’re happy to be in such a time of occasion, because that where they find peace and happiness. The way they find peace and happiness is, for example, karma is something that they can be removed by just two means, just two ways, either you purify it or you experience it, it’s the result of karma. It’s more like the bad karma can be removed just two ways, the one way is you suffer, another way is you purify. If you’re wise, you should purify, if you’re not wise, it isn’t this choice.
So the great practitioners, even they are sick, they rejoice, they’re happy that they’re sick. The way they are happy is because they think that “Oh, I’m removing some of my bad karma, and it’s good that I’m able to remove it now, get rid of the bad karma now when I’m in humans, I’ve lot of facilities”.
When you passed away and you’re born somewhere else and then you suffer, you might not have such facilities like we have now. For example, an animal is sick and a human is sick, the human can talk, we have pain killer, we have lot of other ways, means and things that can keep us happy, that can try to solve our situation in problem and sickness, but animals, they can’t talk. So even if they are sick, they can’t say, unless is something that is very much visible, people don’t know it. And even among animals, if an animal is sick, nobody is going to see, to pity on you, if you are a small animal in some forest, you are sick, it’s very much likely that some other predators can come and eat you.
Human, when you are sick, there are people who come and help you, support you, you can always call 911, is it the number?, in India I don’t know, maybe 100, people don’t know because that doesn’t make any sense, you call and then you really don’t know when this happen or come or whatever.
So those great practitioner they should rejoice. This is the moment everybody suffer, everybody moon like “I’m so sick”, they literally exaggerate and they maybe are sick like 20%, then they make it like 50%, and if you ask them to explain, they wanna explain as if they are the only one who are suffering in the world, they literally exhausted in this way, we all are same.
But the great practitioners, they literally rejoice, they’re happy that they’re in pain. They’re happy that they are able to purify some negative karmas that they have accumulated in past, so that they don’t have to suffer in future, in future the suffering might be much worse, now it’s human, so it’s not really bad. So based on that and also when they are in pain, they try to understand others and they use that pain to understand the pain and sufferings of others and they use that as a energy to generate compassion towards others by understanding the pain of others.
THE MIND
So it is all your mind. You’re having a severe headache, the great practitioners, they use it as a tool to develop compassion, they use it as a tool and then they rejoice and they’re happy. While ordinary people they are having severe headache, they might cause some people, they might get angry so easily, they might yell and someone shout. The pain is like 20%, there is very much likely they wanna make like 50-60% or even more in some cases.
As I said last time, this is one of the reason why understanding of emptiness is so very important, extremely important. When you understand emptiness, then you will realize that it is all mind that projects everything. It is all mind that literally make everything, impute everything, project everything. But those who are extraordinary beings, they understand it and they don’t get involved that they see it as an illusion, so they don’t get affected by it.
But the things as, like ordinary beings, we project everything and then we are in the illusion. We can’t able to see it as an illusion, but we are in the illusion. The mistake, we have a lot ups and downs and it’s more like we create a lot of pain, expectation bla bla and bla because of that illusion.
Our situation is very much like according to Buddha’s sutra, it is kind of interesting. The magician creates, let’s see, a car, the magician creates a beautiful car, it’is not real, it is something that he creates with his skills like magician skills. So then he gets so attached to it and he knows that it is not clear, yet he get so attached to it.
There are the few levels of people, the first type of people is like he creates everything out, then he doesn’t know this is as an illusion and then he shows involving so that he cries, worries, sad, happy, sad, happy, sad, happy and he’s more like a wave.
The second type of person who know that everything is illusion, but they are like a magician knowing this is not true, but he gets so attached to it. When it is there, he’s happy, when it’s not there, he’s not happy, maybe the second person is more if a magician is not able to see the car. Let’s take those persons, the persons who know that is an illusion, it is just created by magic, but he still get attached to it.
So this is a second type of person, now the third type of person who are like Arya beings, extraordinary beings or great realized practitioners, who see everything as an illusion but they
are not affected by it. They see everything is just an illusion and they are not affected by it. So we have to reach to the third level like a third person where we can see everything as an illusion, at the same time, not to get attached to it, not to be in illusion with that, not to be mistaken with this, it is very important. Nowadays, the profound teaching of emptiness is pretty much like the physicists latest findings, pretty much close, they said that things that appear doesn’t really exist the way it appears to eyes.
Let’s take an example of color, if you look deeper and deeper and analyze the color, all you find is some waves, and if you analyze more and more, you might find nothing in there. It is like just projected by our mind when the thing doesn’t exist by its own. It is the mind which projects, it is more like a theater, you see a lot of things on the screen, there is a projector behind you.
So at the beginning, you might think that “Ah this is being projected by a projector” and after a while you get involved into a movie that’s being projected so you forget about the projector. Now you see everything as it exists over there, so based on that you are happy, you are sad, you are happy or sad, something good is happening, you’re so happy, something strange is happening, you’re sad, it’s more like you watch a movie and like it’s the wars in a movie. So this is exactly how things, each and everything have been projected, so in that sense everything is not real, there’s nothing which is real, there’s nothing which is real to our mind, whatever you see is not really in our mind. So that’s why we start the class. There was no sound! That really makes me laugh, it’s not started Heart Sutra yet, why there is no voice as I’m asking to myself.
So like many people might see and understand or think that the Buddhist teachings are like there are some people who say that Buddhism is that kind of science of mind or psychology, this and that. They have a reason because in Buddhism each and everything is based on mind because the mind is the creator of all. Buddhism said that Buddhism doesn’t believe in a Creator God, there is no such a Creator God, but that the mind creates all. It’s not somebody’s mind, it’s your own mind, your own mind creates everything so it is nice that you will understand that you have to take responsible of everything. Something nice because of you, something bad because of you.
I have a friend, he is an auto driver, it’s tuck tuck or rickshaw, I don’t know what you call, let’s say small taxi with three wheels, that’s how we have in India. So, there is one driver and he believes in Islam, so of course he believes in Creator God. He’s like not really rich, but generally he’s a very nice person, I like him in many ways. But one day, just our discussing, because we are in auto, we have to travel like 7-8 minutes and I just talk something. Then he starts to say about his family like he has a daughter dah dah dah, this is happening, that is happening, dah dah and dah and it sounds to me that some people genuinely help him to raise the daughter so that the daughter can be sent to the college for the studies and everything sounds to me that some people are helping.
So just trying to ask some general question regarding that and I can feel like he doesn’t feel gratitude towards the people who help, he doesn’t feel that much grateful to the persons who help. It’s a bit strange to me and then I ask clearly like “What you mean? How do you see those persons?” And he say like ah Allah is helping the daughter, but for him the person who really helped is more like a delivery man.
Like for example, you live far from your parents and your parents send a cheese or a biscuit, let’s say, and then there is a delivery man who deliver the biscuit to you. When you receive the biscuit, you really feel so grateful to your parents for sending that, of course, if we like the biscuit.
You see, sometimes people don’t even look at the delivery man, you don’t care much because you know that he had his own benefits, so there’s nothing that he is doing in here, he’s all the mother whose kindness is there. That’s what general people see it, right? So this person, I’m talking about this individual person, the way he talked to me, I fell as if he see the one who has been so kind to him as a sort of a delivery man, and that’s not fair.
So they see that God is the one who sent all those helps and this man is just a delivery man. He also doesn’t feel grateful for him because he’s a delivery man and he gets his own profit out of deliveries, for example, these delivery men are paid, like you order something online, there is a delivery man, you don’t feel that much because you paid for this delivery as well. So similarly, this person seems to feel like that and I’m not sure if it is with all, I’m not saying that this is how it is with all the people who follow whatever religion. But this particular person that I met seems to be having that sort of thought. There was quite sad and it’s not really fair. He might also not feel grateful to his own parents who literally sacrificed their whole life, he think like it is the Creator who have done all these things and they just like a middle man, like a delivery man, and the father or mother is doing all this kindness, they work hard, we say like “OK, some Creator makes him do that”.
Every individual is different, so I see it as a sort of individual problem. But still in Buddhism there is no Creator God but the mind, it creates everything. So you can give criticism to your mind, if you are happy is because of your specific mind if you’re unhappy is because of a specific mind. So if you think that way that there is a scope that you can develop yourselves, and again, your individual karma and your parents individual karma are different. The one who’s been kind to you, what he is doing is because of your kind, so you appreciate the person because of his compassionate heart.
Even some of the findings these days shows pretty much similar results and also the findings of quantum physics is very helpful to understand that it is all your mind that creates, that makes, that destroys everything happen with us. So when we know the meaning, words are just words. If you can walk without a walking stick, and what’s the point of walking stick? So which is why our focusing more on walking. So let’s see the sutra, you pretty much got the meaning that is already, that is the meaning of the sutra, that’s what sutra explained. So you can just go on once again and then you can feel it more.
THE HEART OF THE PERFECTION OF WISDOM SUTRA (con’t)
So last time we said that …
…at one time.
The Bhagavan was dwelling on Mass of Vultures Mountain
in Rajagriha, a place, together with a great community of monks
and a great community of bodhisattvas.
At that time, the Bhagavan was absorbed in the concentration on the categories of phenomena called “Profound Perception.”
I think there is been through that.
Also, at that time, the Bodhisattva Mahasattva Arya Avalokiteshvara
Also, at that time, at that time means the time where the Buddha was absorbed in the meditation. The Bodhisattva Mahasattva Arya Avalokiteshvara is one of Boddhisattva, one of the disciple of Buddha at the time, which were there at the time, Avalokiteshvara also
looked upon the very practice of the profound perfection of wisdom
and beheld those five aggregates also as empty of inherent nature.
So Avalokiteshvara also meditates on the profound perfection of wisdom, practice of emptiness of five aggregates. The five aggregates are something that you will find below. When the Buddha was meditating also the Arya Avalokiteshvara was also contemplating on the emptiness and the wisdom realizing emptiness.
At the time through the power of Buddha, venerable Shariputra said this to the Bodhisattva Mahasattva Arya Avalokiteshvara, Shariputra is one of the main disciple of Buddha as I told last time. So Shariputra asked Avalokiteshvara, it’s not like he had the doubt in himself and he asked by himself, but he was more like through the power of Buddha, Shariputra, even if he didn’t want to, the question automatically goes, he automatically raised questions by the power of Buddha. He was more like, through this sort of telepathic way, even if he didn’t want to, Buddha made him said that, ask that, so this is through the blessings, the way Buddha bless him to say these words without his control. There are of three types, it can be physical, mental and verbal, so this one is through the power of the mind, to the power of the meditation of Buddha. Buddha blessed him and let him see, voice this question by the power of Buddha. And the question is, like
“How should any sons of the lineage train and the daughters of the lineage train or practice who wishes to practice the activity of the profound perfection of wisdom?”
so the question is more like, the English is not really as it is in Tibetan, so in Tibetan, it’s more like the Shariputra asked asked Avalokiteshvara:
How should those people who wish to understand emptiness, practice the profound perfection of wisdom, and the wisdom realizing emptiness and emptiness, so how one can practice on these two things, the wisdom realizing emptiness and wisdom, the profound perfection wisdom and the wisdom realizing emptiness.
So “He said that, and the Bodhisattva Mahasattva Arya Avalokiteshvara said this to the venerable Sharadvati putra”
Now here you might find two different names like Shariputra and Sharadvati putra, this is all same, Shariputra is the name, putra is more like a son, Shari is like a mother, Shari is been given by the mother name. I won’t go to the long story, but Shari is sort of mother’s name. So he the son of that mother, that’s why people called him Shariputra.
And Sharadvati Putra, dvati is more like a father’s last name, the father’surname. So Sharadvati Putra is more like a part of mother name and a part of father’s name, Shariputra is just a mother name. So this is just a same person. So then the Shariputra asked Avalokiteshvara how to practice on perfection of wisdom and the emptiness, then Avalokiteshvara answered, Bodhisattva Mahasattva Arya Avalokiteshvara said this to the venerable Shariputra, this is what Avalokiteshvara said:
“Shariputra, any son of the lineage or daughter of the lineage who wishes to practice the activity of the profound perfection of wisdom,
should look upon it like this, correctly and repeatedly beholding
those five aggregates also as empty of inherent nature”.
Now this part is like Avalokiteshvara answering in a brief manner. So after that Avalokiteshvara answer by attaching to the five paths. To achieve Buddahood you have to go through five paths: the path of accumulation, the path of preparation, the path of seeing, the path of meditation and the no more learning; the no more learning is a state of Buddha. There’s four paths that you have to go through, pass through, so general people, ordinary people like us, we are not even on the first path, you’ve to achieve Bodhicitta, when you become Bodhisattva then you will get on the first path.
So now Avalokiteshvara is explaining briefly and after that Avalokiteshvara will explain in details, so this is the line,Avalokiteshvara is explaining briefly which says that “Shariputra, any son of the lineage or daughter of the lineage…”, it means that any sons of of the lineage or daughter of the lineage, now lineage here it means that any males who believe or trust or wish to understand the emptiness, who are ready to understand the emptiness, who are willing to understand the emptiness or any daughter who are willing to understand the emptiness, who wish to understand the emptiness. On those,
“son of the lineage or daughter of the lineage who wish to practice the activity of the profound perfection of wisdom
should look upon it like this correctly and repeatedly beholding those five aggregates also as empty of inherent nature”.
So here 5 aggregates, as I said before, you’re gona find on the last line, 5 aggregates are: aggregate of feeling, aggregate of discrimination, compositional factors, it’s more like compounded phenomena and then, no, here is only four, it should start from the form, theaggregate of feelings, the aggregate of discrimination, compositional factor and then the consciousness.
These are the five aggregates, so the Avalokiteshvara say that those five you should see
“correctly and repeatedly beholding those five aggregates” as I just mentioned “also as empty of inherent nature”.
It is exactly what we discussed before, inherent nature, it doesn’t exist by its own as it appears to our mind, it depends in the way that it is interdependent, it is being. We see this not because something exists by its own without depending on mind, but we see it because our mind projected. So there is a brief answer first and then after this he will explain in details so here he says that after going through briefly, then he elaborates it, so when he explains on details, he explains by attaching to the paths, like path of accumulation, preparation, seeing, meditation, no more learning.
“Form is empty; Emptiness is form.
Emptiness is not other than form; form is also not other than emptiness.
In the same way, feeling, discrimination, compositional factors, and consciousness are empty”.
So when he attached to the practice of the path of accumulation, he said “Form is empty, form is emptiness, emptiness is form and emptiness is not other than form and form is not other than emptiness, so this is called fourfold emptiness. So this,
“In the same way, feeling, discrimination, compositional factors and consciousness are empty”.
First, these fourfold emptiness when he said like as “ form is emptiness”, it means that form as it inherently exists to our mind, but form doesn’t exist as it appears to our only mind. So mind
appear as it exists inherently, but there doesn’t exist, when you check thoroughly, it is empty of inherent existence. So that’s why it is called “form is empty”, it doesn’t mean that form doesn’t exist, of course form exists, but form doesn’t exist as it appears to our mind, that is what it means by “form is emptiness”.
So now the second one is “emptiness is form”, things may not exist inherently, but still the form exists. So even if it doesn’t exist inherently, but still it exists by depending in a way of dependent origination, that way, emptiness is form.
So now “emptiness is not other than form”, which means that you cannot separate emptiness from the form. It’s one entity, it’s just like a two sides of one coin, it’s just one entity. You cannot classify the thing that we’ve been projected by our mind, it’s emptiness and for me is something different. The thing that is being projected by our mind itself, the cup, let’s say, or the car that is being projected by our mind is emptiness and there is also a car.
So you cannot separate that emptiness part or that’s projected part from the form or the car. That’s why emptiness is not other than form, and the form is also not other than emptiness, so you can’t pretty much separate these two things. So in the similar way, the feeling also, feeling is empty, emptiness is feeling, emptiness is no rather than feelings, feeling is not other than emptiness. Again, the discrimination, the discrimination is also one of the mental factors which thinks “Ah this is that, ah this is this”, this is the one which discriminate the things by its own entity. Also the
discrimination is emptiness, emptiness is discrimination, the emptiness is not other than discrimination, discrimination is not other than emptiness. So likewise compositional factors, the same thing. Consciousness is emptiness, emptiness is consciousness, consciousness cannot be separated from emptiness, emptiness cannot be separated from consciousness, that’s why it means. And maybe let’s leave it over here, so we’ll finish the emptiness which has been attached with the fourfold emptiness and which is the practice of the path of accumulation, those beings were on the path of the accumulation. So we will go towards the second one, the path of preparation, the practice of path of preparation, the next week.
Questions and answers
- Sometimes when I meditate I think about some funny moments in my life. How can I stop that? It makes me laugh sometimes?
Generally, it depends on why a person meditate. If you wish to find some instant peace, happiness, love, maybe you can think about some instant funny moments. But it very much depends on what kind of meditation that you are meditating if you are meditating on concentration like an aim, and also meditation is a tool to apply the antidotes. Meditation is a tool with which you can apply the antidotes like love, compassion, understanding, patience, generosity, morality, wisdom; analytical meditation abilities are all these things. So if you are meditating to reduce the stress, anxiety, depression, anger, jealousy and ego, pride, these things, you gotta make sure that you don’t distract to other things than those antidotes, because there is the thing that will help us to do this, but generally it is no wrong in contemplating on funny moments, it’s more like we watch a funny video or we listen to some funny jokes and of course it brings instant peace and happiness to just generate a nice time. Yeah, there is also OK, not an issue.
- In thequantum physics, the observer cannot be separated from object. Observer cannot separate it from object. That is really interesting and very similar to Buddhism.
Yeah, that’s very true. In Buddhists, there are like 4 different schools: The Great Exposition School, The Sutra School, The Mind Only School, and The Middle Way School. According to The Mind Only School you cannot separate the eye and the form. Form is one entity with the eyes, so it is just there is nothing outside, it is just in your eyes. For example, you’re sleeping and you’re having a dream, you can still see one hundred elephants in your small room which is not possible, there’s no hundred elephants in the room, but that might appear to your mind. In dreams it can be many funny things which may not exist, but everything has appeared to the eye consciousness, but that is not real, not true. So Mind Only School says that it is exactly like dreams, there is no car or tree out there, it is just one entity of the mind. This is one entity of the eye consciousness, so the observer or the consciousness is not other than, there is no consciousness, there is no form which is different entity with the consciousness.
- Is emptiness similar to nothingness? Can you explain more of form and formless?
Very different. You might find some people explaining emptiness as pretty much nothing else, but that is a huge confusion in there, huge difference, nothingness and emptiness. Nothingness, if I understand the word nothingness that it sounds like thing doesn’t exist at all, in that sense, form is not nothingness because form exist. But form is emptiness which means that form exists, but it doesn’t exist the way it appears to our mind. Let’s see colours exist, ah we discussed about this last time that there are some animals who don’t see lot of colors, they’re like color blind so all they see is like maybe white and black and I don’t know if they see that sort of the four colors, but they can’t see lot of colors. So if somebody asked if color really exists by its own, there is a big question. No, it is all in the eyes, not out there. The color doesn’t exist by its own, so it is just in the eyes. It is just projected by the eyes which see it. So the eyes which project different colors can see different colors, the eyes which don’t project different color, don’t see different colors.
- So form and emptiness are two sides of the coin?
Yes, form and emptiness like you cannot separate form from emptiness and emptiness from form. What we see is projected by our mind and what we projected by our mind is what we see. Form is what we project by our mind and what we project our mind is the form. This is interesting and through the quantum physics maybe it can be a bit more clear. Trying to think about what quantum physicists say, and then it is lot easier, it is more like we get one closer emptiness, well, the thing about the illusion, thing about the magician and these things will really help us to get closer and to understand it closer.
- Could we say that the Buddha nature is also empty?
Yes, everything, Buddha, Buddha nature, sutra, emptiness itself, is also emptiness, everything. Each and everything is being projected by our mind, but the problem that we see as it is interdependent, we see as it exists by itself without depending on mind, inherently exist, so that is what we are mistaken with. Oh, that was really nice question. Thank you.
- And also when we understand interdependence then we can understand emptiness?
Yes, if we are able to understand the most subtle interdependence then we already understood that emptiness. So, dependent origination or interdependence has three layers, when we realize the most subtle one, we have to go through emptiness.
- There is the time we realize emptiness?
Yes, interdependence is the definition of emptiness, without thinking interdependence, there is no way that one can realize emptiness.
I’m really happy talking about these points and I hope that with the time things get more and more clearer, so I’m not focusing too much on the words because if you get the point, there is the point. So if you don’t get the point, even if we try to go through the word meanings, you might know the word meanings, but you don’t get the point, so then no point. Reading these texts in few times would be nice, you may not understand anything, but then it will create a sort of platform in your mind.
The Note down from the Dharma Talk on The Heart of Perfection of Wisdom Sutra by Lama Nawang Kunphel on 20 June 2021, organized by “On The Road of Yoga”