I thought maybe I would go over the material. So there's the cushion over here.

[02:02]

There's one here too. So Sikhita starts out by, it says, tosans, five ranks, five positions. He says, in searching for the ox, we were mainly dealing with the process of attaining enlightenment. So as I mentioned last time, there are many circular forms that were used as teaching devices in the Tang Dynasty.

[03:05]

And the 10 ox-herding pictures is one of them. in the newsletter, we have a parody of the 10 oxfording pictures. It's called the 10 sheep herding pictures. So those are circular forms, and each one has a different aspect. And the 10 oxfording pictures, Sakita comments on those just before this. And he says, these 10 depict the route from beginning to search for the ox to the end of finding realization and expressing it in 10 pictures.

[04:09]

A little louder? So he says, Tozan's five ranks are concerned with matters after enlightenment, that is, with the cultivation of holy Buddhahood. But Dogen wasn't concerned with the ten ox-herding pitchers for various reasons. For one thing, ten ox-herding pitchers seem to start from by step gaining enlightenment. And for Dogen, practice begins with enlightenment, even in the first stages of practice.

[05:13]

So he didn't like that layout so much. And of course, as I said, there were reasons why he didn't comment on the five ranks, except in his own way. He didn't talk about the five ranks as the five ranks. He talked about them in various ways in his Shobo Genso, but not directly. So, you know, some styles of Zen talk about gradual practice from But Soto Zen and Dogen's practice talks about starting from enlightenment with gradual practice. So it's kind of the other way around.

[06:15]

We start by jumping in the ocean. And the wonderful thing about Zazen is that you can jump into the realm of enlightenment right away. whether or not you understand it. You don't have to understand it in order to practice it. So he said, certain schools, certain Buddhist schools assert that there are 52 stages through which the enlightened person has to pass However, Tozan's five positions are sufficient to enable us to grasp the essential points. So, before commenting on them in detail, however, we must introduce and explain certain essential terms used in describing the ranks. In the Avatamsaka Sutra, gives him something.

[07:34]

And these are called the fifty-two stages of practice. But he says, Tozan reduces them to five. And then he says, so, when one attains Kensho, which is awakening, And the habitual way of consciousness falls off, there appears what is called dai-in-kyo-chi. That may be translated as the perfect mirror of wisdom. The great round, dai means great, in is round, which means here round in maturity, and hence perfect. And kyo is mirror. And chi is wisdom. So this is called the great round mirror of wisdom. And I'll talk about this tonight. He says, everyone is innately equipped with this mirror of wisdom.

[08:40]

However, in most people, it has long been veiled because of the activity of our topsy-turvy, delusive thought. And in absolute Samadhi, the veil is cleared away, and the perfect mirror is allowed to appear. This condition constitutes Tozan's first rank, which is this one. The mirror of wisdom, however, still remains in darkness in the absolute samadhi of the first rank. This rank corresponds to the eighth stage of searching for the ox, illustrated by the circle in which body and mind have fallen off. I think I talked about that a bit last time. I didn't say it in those terms exactly. So then he says, the great mirror of wisdom becomes brilliantly lit in the positive samadhi of one whose cultivation of holy Buddha has reached full maturity.

[09:50]

Samadhi is a term which means at one with. It has various definitions, but, you know, means concentration. Superficially it means concentration. But as a term, in Zen it means at one with, or not separate from. So in Zazen, samadhi is not a special state of mind, but a state of mind of non-duality, state of non-duality, where each moment is not separate from ultimate reality.

[10:50]

And he, Sakhita, uses two terms. He says positive samadhi and absolute samadhi. So absolute samadhi He equates with Sādhanā, where samādhi of stillness and absolute positive samādhi is the samādhi of activity, which are the two sides of our practice. And the first position would be the position of absolute samadhi, where the world of activity is left behind. Somebody always calls at this time, doesn't they? And the second rank would be the realm of positive samadhi,

[11:53]

where you enter the world of activity without leaving behind the realm of stillness. I think we talked a little bit about this last time when we talked about the movie. You can have very good concentration in a movie, but it's still not samadhi. Samadhi is the realm where body, mind and the universe are engaged in one activity. And the subject and the object, although the subject is the subject and the object is the object, They're not separate.

[12:55]

So in concentration, when an artist is working on a painting, you feel the time has stopped. And this is very good concentration. But it's not quite samadhi, because samadhi is also activity which is not self-centered. where self is not, or ego is not in the foreground. Could an artist draw? Yeah. So, in positive samadhi, you know, this is the in our daily life, actually, that we should practice samadhi.

[14:00]

But when you start talking about samadhi, then it gets, you know, it's a little intangible. So we don't usually talk about it so much. Because then people kind of equate it with voodoo or something. Strange powers. But it's really just selfless activity. simply put, but radical selfless activity. So he uses these two terms a lot. I've never heard anybody else use these terms in that way. It may be his own way of expressing. So, He says, this rank corresponds to the eighth stage of searching for the ox, illustrated by the circle in which body and mind have fallen off.

[15:03]

This is samadhi. The great mirror of wisdom becomes brilliantly lit in the positive samadhi of one whose cultivation of holy Buddhahood has reached full maturity. fear of positive samadhi. So I think that's a good point. We will use his terms. The first position refers to absolute samadhi, which is zazen. The other four refer to positive samadhi, activity in the world, in the realm of worldly activity. And we should note here that the fact that, apart from the first, Tozan's rank positions all relate to positive samadhi should not be taken as belittling the importance of absolute samadhi.

[16:17]

Of course not. The latter is the foundation of all Zen First, the brilliance of the mirror in positive samadhi is comparable to that of broad daylight. The silence and oblivion of absolute samadhi to the darkness of midnight. So we talked about that last time. The great mirror of wisdom is also referred to by Zen terms, shou, authentic or genuine, and hom-bun. Hon is original and bun is part. So, you know, original face, actually. So, hom-bun can be described as absolute, genuine, dark and empty. That's what we said up here. Thoughtless condition. Your development will come to an end. You must return to the world, though, to the state in which your consciousness operates normally and live in positive samadhi.

[17:21]

Here, however, you are necessarily bound by the restrictions of time, space, and causation, and you live in the world of individuality, confrontation, and differentiation. However, when you have once experienced the absolute equality of the great mirror of wisdom, you can go on to attain a freedom of mind that goes beyond such discrimination. This maturity in which, while yet living in the world of time and space and causation, you transcend the limits of that world is called the wisdom of equality. It is to this maturity that Tozan's ranks point the way. Now, he's talked about two of these wisdoms. He's talking about the mirror wisdom and the wisdom of equality. He says that the reason that the old ancestors gave us the five ranks was to help us to understand the four wisdoms.

[18:23]

So I'll have to talk about the four wisdoms. And the sixth ancestor, Daikon Eno, in the Platform Sutra, four wisdoms with the three bodies of Buddha and the eight consciousnesses. I'm giving a lot of numbers here. It's getting more complicated. But I think that we can understand a bit about these qualities. So we have three, four, five, and eight.

[19:35]

You know, in the meal chant, we have the Mahārāja Chāṇāla. And these are the three bodies of Buddha. At some point in the history of Mahayana Buddhism, the ancestors came up with the idea of the three bodies of Buddha, which is really one body, but with three aspects.

[20:48]

So, dharmakaya is our nature. I couldn't leave myself any room here, but Dharmakaya is our nature, which is undifferentiated, and is the basis of all existence, and is the potential from which everything springs. It's called the Dharmakaya. Buddha, and it's represented by Vairochana. And Vairochana's Buddha just sits there, doesn't do anything. But everything emanates from Vairochana Buddha. All existence emanates from... It's the closest that Buddhism gets to God, in that kind of way. And Sambhogakaya is called the reward body.

[21:51]

But first I'll talk about nirmanakaya because samogakaya is in between. So nirmanakaya means manifested. Nirmanakaya Shakyamuni. Shakyamuni Buddha was a manifest Buddha. Someone who walked and talked and ate and saw and heard. So nirmanakaya means manifest. of samadhi. And sambhogakaya is called the reward body sometimes, but you could say that dharmakaya or vairagchana is our nature. And Sambhogakaya is our wisdom, because Sambhogakaya is like the active principle of Buddha, the creative side, which is in between

[23:12]

stillness and activity. It's the creative matrix of Buddha. Is it a description? As far as being in between, is it a description of something that actually happens? Or a name? Well, it's the wisdom. Rather than be theoretical, you know, the Sixth Patriarch says that Samogukaya is your own wisdom. It's prajna. And dharmakaya is your true nature. And nirmanakaya is your various activities. So another way of saying dharmakaya is vairocana, sambhogakaya you can also say is manjushri, because manjushri is the bodhisattva which personifies wisdom. And you can say that nirmanakaya is samantabhadra, bodhisattva who personifies practice.

[24:28]

So, these are the three natures, the three bodies of Buddha, which are all one body, but they're just three aspects of our nature. This was devised necessarily because people, you know, had these various ideas or questions about, well, what is Buddha? Of course, Buddha is the person. But Buddha is also a creative principle. And Buddha is also the nature of everything. So when you talk about Buddha, what are you talking about? So these three aspects were put forth in order to clarify the various aspects of who we are, or who the Buddha is. So these are the three bodies, but the three bodies are three aspects of one body, and you can see them in various ways.

[25:39]

round mirror wisdom, which he mentioned. Third one, It's called various things. I call it discerning wisdom and perfecting of actions. A question? On Virukana? Virukana. It just says a little. that there is an unborn, unchanging, undying, something or other, and without that there's no enlightenment?

[27:07]

Is that vairagchana? Well, yeah, it's vairagchana, dharmakaya. So there are the four great wisdoms. And, yeah, you can't see it over there, can you? Then if I turn over there, you can see them here. So I'll say the first one is the round mirror wisdom. The second one is the equality wisdom. The third one is discerning wisdom. And the fourth is perfecting of action. So the mirror wisdom is the wisdom which sees everything just as it is. Mirror means, you know, when something passes in front of the mirror, if it's a good mirror, it reflects everything just as it is, but it doesn't hold anything.

[28:12]

When the object is passed, the mirror is no longer reflecting it. It only reflects what comes, and it reflects it exactly as it is, and doesn't comment on it. When we see something, we usually comment on it. We name things and think about things and mull it over. But the round mirror of wisdom just sees, which is very hard to do. So in Zazen, the point of Zazen is to just see everything as it is. That's the point of Zazen. without making any judgment or creating any partiality. The mirror sees without partiality. So this is why we can call this kind of concentration samadhi, because there's no partiality and it doesn't divide and doesn't judge.

[29:16]

So when we sit in zazen, we have some feeling, but it's just a feeling. It may be a good feeling or a bad feeling or pain or pleasure, whatever it is, but the mirror mind sees it just as what it is. The judgmental mind or the discriminating mind says, oh, this is pain. Oh, I don't like this. Oh, I'd rather have something else. This is discriminating mind. So The mirror mind, the round wisdom mirror mind, just sees everything as it is, without discriminating. So this is called non-discriminating mind. Non-discriminating mind. But then you say, well of course we have to discriminate, which we do.

[30:17]

We're always making some kind of decision or judgment We always have to design things. So we live in the realm of discrimination. But because we live in the realm of discrimination, we don't see things. We see everything partially. Partially means divided, but it also means partial to my... It means I would favor something. as those two meanings. We divide it into parts, and we also favor one of the parts. But the Brown Bearer Wisdom doesn't do that. It just sees everything as it is. So, everything as it is is like this.

[31:21]

But then something comes in there, right? and disturbs this wholeness. So, in samadhi, we don't try to get away from the disturbance, because something's always flying in front of the moon, so to speak. There's always a cloud flying in front of the moon, or a tree, or a bird. And when you see a tree in front of the moon, it's rather beautiful. Or when you see a cloud coming across the moon, it's rather beautiful, even though the moon is a little bit obscured. And Zazen is also like this. We say, sit, sazen, and don't think.

[32:27]

And your mind should be like a sheet of white paper. Sometimes you say like the empty sky. But sometimes like a sheet of white paper. But a sheet of white paper is blank. But when you have a sheet of white paper, something gets written on it. So even though we have a clear mind, something's always being written on the mind. People say, well, I sat the whole period and I only had one moment, one second of clear mind, as if there's something wrong with that. This is the big criticism, that people say, I only had one minute of clear mind. Am I just wasting my time? But something is always being written on the sheet of paper. And if there's nothing written on it, it's not really a sheet of paper.

[33:32]

We say, that's a blank piece of paper, but then as soon as something's written on it, it really becomes a piece of paper. Just like your car is sitting out there. You say, that's my car, but it doesn't really become a car until you get in it and drive it. The mind, mirror mind, discerns all the impressions that are traveling across it. But the mirror mind doesn't make judgments. Our judgmental mind, our discriminating mind, makes judgments all the time. But the mirror mind just sees everything as it is. So in zazen we have the opportunity to just leave it alone. Not to fiddle with it. Not to fiddle with feelings, emotions, thoughts. Just let it be.

[34:34]

And whatever comes across, that's what's happening. It's wonderful. No adjustment of your set necessary. No adjustment of your set necessary. And this is samadhi, just the oneness of duality. So discrimination is going on, you know, in some way, because we always have to make choice. But the difference between ordinary discrimination and discrimination in Samadhi is that the discrimination is based on non-discriminating mind. Aren't you kind of sneaking into the second rank, though?

[35:38]

Oh, I'm sneaking. I'm sneaking. I mean, I'm not staying in one place or another. But it seems like the first rank... Oh, I see. ...there really isn't discrimination. Well, You know, there's always some discrimination. You can't say, that's right, that's right, that's right, because the discriminating mind is concealed within the non-discriminating mind. Because just to be able to sit means that you're making a choice. You know, just to hold your back straight means that you're making some choice. but it's not self-centered thinking. So, the second, this is the first one, and this is the second, is the wisdom of equality.

[36:41]

Equality sees everything as the same, and that's why it's an aspect of the round mirror. The round mirror is the basis, but because the round mirror actually... Well, I'll talk about this later, but the equality sees everything as the same. In other words, You know, when we look around us, we see that everything's different, right? But we don't necessarily see that everything has the same quality. There's a quality of sameness that is peculiar to everything. So, ultimately, everything has the same basis. even though the faces appear different.

[37:45]

So when we talk about buddha nature, buddha nature is like the one being or dharmakaya, vairochana. But vairochana has many aspects and all the phenomenal qualities of the world are the aspects of Vairochana. Ultimately, everything is equal because we say a mouse is little and an elephant is big. But ultimately, an elephant is not big and a mouse is not small. But we just say that one is big and one is small because we're comparing.

[38:46]

But a mouse is quite huge if you're an ant. But everything has, you know, each individual thing is equal in Buddha nature to everything else. Even though one thing is big and another thing is small, the Buddha nature of each existence is the same. So to be able to see that sameness in all existence is called the equality wisdom. Wisdom is great equality. And the third one, the discerning wisdom, recognizes all the differences. So you can say that This is horizontal, is equality, right? There's no hierarchy. Everything's the same. Everything has the same nature.

[39:50]

And in the discerning wisdom, everything is different. That's the vertical, and this is hierarchy. Everything relates to everything else in a certain hierarchy. I don't mean hierarchy in the sense of of better or worse. But just because of the peculiarities of each existence, everything is on a different plane with everything else. Well, that's right. You're recognizing all the ways of separating and recognizing that separation. That's right. And so right here is where the equality and differentiation meet.

[41:00]

And right there is where each thing lives. Because we have both of those of sameness and difference. And this is how we can have discriminating mind based on non-discriminating mind. Because this is non-discrimination. And this is discrimination. And they have to balance each other. We talk about non-discriminating mind a lot, but also we have to recognize discriminating mind as well. You can't do away with discriminating mind because we live in the realm of discrimination, but our discriminating mind is in balance with our non-discriminating mind, so that we have... That's where the mirror wisdom is.

[42:03]

which sees everything just as it is. This is called big mind. Yeah, right. Well, yeah, discriminating is different than discerning, but discerning has this quality of discrimination because discrimination means to separate. And when we look at each individual thing or person, then we're discriminating one thing from another. We're saying, you're Ross, and so forth. So that's discrimination. It's not bad, but unless it's coming from seeing clearly, then it's biased.

[43:15]

I guess my question has to do with that statement about it's biased. The discrimination here does not include That's right, doesn't it? Although, judgment of right and wrong is another level of discrimination. But yeah, that's true. This level of discrimination is not judgmental. It's merely seeing. And, you know, in the five positions, the dark circle is called the real, and this one's called the biased, or inclined. Well, it just seems like the first three Wisdoms are completely intertwined. Oh yeah, they're all intertwined.

[44:16]

All five of them are intertwined. But the first two are kind of the two sides. Like this. But no, I'm assuming the first three wisdoms. Oh, the first three wisdoms, yeah, are what? The way you've been talking about them, they are the same. The drawing, I think, reflects that. Well, they're all aspects of the same thing. And the perfecting of action wisdom is taking the data through our senses, through the doors of perception, and transforming them into wisdom. Transforming... Well, I talked about this last time. I talked about desire and... Intention.

[45:18]

Intention. Right. So, you know, we have the five or six senses, actually, if we count the thinking mind as one of the senses. And we do. And so these are the doors of perception. And through the doors of perception, desire is stimulated. And when desire is turned into or transformed into intention rather than karmic activity, then it's called the perfection of action. Our activity is called the perfection of action, and that's this fourth. The wisdom is actually being able to direct the sense data

[46:22]

which is vijnana or consciousness into wisdom. So then we have to talk about the eight consciousnesses. It's a little bit labyrinthine but it's very interesting because it helps us to explain So, this is one, two, three, four, five.

[47:54]

We usually say five consciousnesses, but in Buddhism we say six, because thinking is a... You can think without having an object. So, the thinking mind is... is considered one of the sense, one of the doorways of perception. And then, and this, so we have these five, and the sixth one is called consciousness. Umano vijnana. Vijnana means consciousness, awareness, perception.

[48:57]

So that's the sixth, which is mind, consciousness. Then we have what's called Manas in Buddhism. Manas, which is another aspect of Vijnana, or consciousness. And then we have, that's the seventh consciousness. alaya-vijnana. Manas is also an aspect of consciousness, but I'll explain what it means. So alaya-vijnana, or the eighth level of consciousness, is called the storehouse consciousness. Store. And when we have perform any kind of karmic activity, each activity creates a seed, just like plants.

[50:01]

And the seed is deposited in the alive or repository consciousness. right, and the seed is sprouted, and it comes out as habit energy, or reflex, or... In other words, everything, all organic creatures plant their own seeds. You know, everything's doing this, right? And there's no reason why mental activity doesn't do it. And it does. So, when we learn something, it's stored in the repository of consciousness. And when we do something, the seeds of our actions are stored. And then, so, you know, when we talk about karma result,

[51:06]

the result is the sprouting of the seeds into some kind of action. So that's why, you know, sometimes people say, well, Buddhists, you know, since there's no God who's going to punish you for your bad actions, you can do anything you want. But actually, if you understand the law of karma, you realize that whatever you do is creating seeds for your future suffering. It's actually called retribution, karmic retribution, which just means result. It's a kind of blanket term for the result of your actions. All actions create seeds, which create a result of like kind.

[52:09]

So that's why, you know, if you're practicing Buddhism, you try to do good things rather than bad things, because bad things lead to bad consequences, and good things lead to good consequences. Because if you plant apples, then you get apple seeds, and you continue to have more apples. And apple seeds don't produce prunes, you know. So everything sprouts according to the kind of seeds that are planted. This is basic understanding of karma and its result. So the seeds are stored in the ālaya-vijñāna. Ālaya-vijñāna is like... I have a lot of theories about what ālaya-vijñāna actually is.

[53:18]

Sometimes there's Vijnana, which is the ninth consciousness. And the Vijnanavadins sometimes refer to this as Buddha nature. And these two are very similar, except that this one is the Alaya Vijnana when it's purified. When consciousness becomes purified, it becomes wisdom. So I have to talk about this. So this is the alaya-vijnana, is the repository, and it's kind of neutral, you know, it doesn't, the mirror wisdom is, alaya-vijnana is like mirror wisdom. Mirror. It just reflects everything as it is, you know, so no matter how you think about what you did,

[54:21]

you know, how biased your own idea is about things, the laya vijnana just tells the truth. Inside of each one of us, no matter how biased our ideas about things are, the laya vijnana actually reflects truth. So you can actually see the truth anytime you want to. All you have to do is let go of your bias, and the laya vijnana will shine out, you know, and we'll see things in a truthful way. Alan? where each of our actions literally affects everything and everybody, then you could see there'd be one big storm. Yeah. Well, that's right. So, alaya vijaya is sometimes called repository consciousness.

[55:25]

I mean, it's called collective unconscious. Jung, you know, was very interested in this. And I think Jung had some theory about collective unconscious. that it's the collective unconsciousness, unconscious, which stores all of the coded, the code of all humanity's collective stuff since the beginning of time. Yeah? Wouldn't alaya-visyana also include the subconscious? I mean, if we're using Well, it's sometimes called the repository of truth and falseness.

[56:34]

So manas has a function. The seventh level of consciousness has a function, and it conveys the information from the first five or six consciousnesses to the Alaya Vijnana and back and forth. It's sometimes called a conveyor consciousness. It's the messenger of information. But because it's the messenger of information, manas, it's also called the individuating consciousness because it separates out information and also sees itself as separate.

[57:44]

So this is called, Manas is called ego consciousness, which is level of consciousness which sees itself as an individual. that recognizes, you know, I am so-and-so, right? And I am a subject and recognizes objects in the world. So it separates subject from object and creates ego. So the seventh consciousness has a kind of false sense of self, creates a false sense of self. And this is a great stumbling block for human beings, is the creation of the false sense of self.

[58:52]

Because the manas, in its position at the center of consciousness, tends to take over the role of mind consciousness, which is also kind of ego consciousness, but not so strong. And instead of just doing its job of relaying information in a neutral way, it becomes self-conscious. So it's also called the self-conscious aspect. Living without a trace is like when the seventh consciousness is just doing its work of conveying information and stops acting like it owns everything.

[60:01]

It stops acting like it's the boss. So it takes over the function of the boss. It has a function. We say, well, we have to get rid of ego. Getting rid of ego is like saying getting rid of desire. You don't get rid of ego or desire, but ego and desire have to find their right places in the hierarchy of consciousness. Is there a storage when there is no ego? Yeah. Storage? Yeah, because the seeds of activity are always being stored. There's still, as long as there's activity, there's storage. So, Manas says, seems to me, it would be great to look back at what you said about the wisdoms, the discriminating, it seems like it's a discriminating wisdom out of control, with no equality, no balance.

[61:07]

Well, it's, what it is, you see, is consciousness without wisdom. But the eight consciousnesses are nine, but the eight, when the eight consciousnesses are transformed or turned, they become the four wisdoms. That's the point. So before the eight consciousnesses are transformed into the four wisdoms, you have desire and control instead of intention. In other words, as long as the seventh consciousness is not controlled by wisdom, it's just pulled around by desire. And then the whole organism gets attuned toward self-centeredness.

[62:15]

So when the seventh consciousness, manas, assumes its rightful place, then you say there's no self-centeredness, no self-conscious self-centeredness. But then where is the centeredness? Yeah, the centeredness is round. It's called harmony. The centeredness is called harmony of all things, right? It's called body and mind dropped. So, when intention takes, when desire becomes intention, that's turning the consciousness, turning the

[63:16]

vijnanas into prajnas, into wisdom. Then we have the alaya, which becomes the mirror wisdom. And the seventh consciousness becomes the equality wisdom. There's the seventh consciousness, wisdom of equality, instead of standing out, instead of, the seven consciousnesses is able to see the equality of everything. So, you know, what is it that makes something either egotistical or not egotistical? De Mano says, well, I'm the center of the universe. which is not false.

[64:25]

There's some reason why Manas does that. But Manas doesn't recognize that you also are the center of the universe. And so each one of us feels, you know, the universe does revolve around each one of us. But we don't think that. We think that the universe just revolves around me. And when it just revolves around me, then everyone else becomes an object, and I'm the subject. But when we realize that the universe revolves around each one of us in the same way, then we're all at the center of the same universe. And that's non-ego. So ego thinks of itself only as the center. and everything else as objects belonging to that center. Do you see the difference? Could you explain the mind consciousness again, number six?

[65:36]

Oh, mind consciousness is the consciousness which separates the various ... the information from the various consciousnesses. and thinks. So, I hear the airplane. That's mind consciousness. Mind consciousness doesn't say, I see the airplane. It says, I hear the airplane. But Tozan says, when consciousness is transformed, then you should be able to see the airplane, to hear. I see through my ear and hear through my eye. He says that. I don't know if he means it literally, but he does say that. And how is that different than manas? You said, I hear the airplane. Right. I hear the airplane is manas.

[66:39]

It's better to say, there's an airplane being heard. See, to say, the airplane is being heard. That's leaving out I. And it's possible to talk that way, but ordinarily we don't talk that way. Thanks for dull writing. Our language is oriented toward I, you know, the first person. But it's possible, I mean there are languages that don't use the first person. Yeah, mind consciousness is separating out hearing from seeing. Right, and it's modest in sort of a deluded way or something like that. It would also say that in some sense. Yes, yeah. You said there was a subtle difference between the two. I'm trying to figure out what the difference is. Well, they both are discerning. Both of them are discriminating.

[67:45]

They both discriminate. But mind consciousness just discriminates for practical purposes, whereas Manas discriminates on the basis of promoting itself. or partiality, or self-protection. You know, the various reasons why ego comes into being. Fear, anxiety, and greed, anger, and delusion. Number six is more just like a function. Yeah, number six is like a function, a mind function, thinking function. Manas as the I. That's right.

[68:58]

Manas as the I. And if there were no I, then there would be no seed planted. It would just be a perception that passed. It wouldn't be held. But as soon as you say I, then you're planting a seed. Well, I'm not sure if that's so or not, but possibly. I'm not sure when the seeds are not planted. Because it's also possible to plant... all karma is not bad, you know? Right. There's good, bad, and neutral. But there's no volition behind adding the I. There was no motivational factor, which has to do with planting a seed for karma and then the resultant. Right. First, it's the sound. And where does the hearing the sound then get translated into, oh, that sounds like an airplane, and then it gets into, oh, I heard an airplane.

[70:02]

That's right. So there are three levels of perception, at least. I mean, we can talk about three levels. There are millions of levels. But first level of perception is there's a sound. Just the perception of the sound. Now somebody was telling me that Professor Kalupahana says that all thinking is, or all perception is naming. It's impossible to get away from naming if you think. I don't know if that's true or not, but I don't want to argue it. But the first perception is just bare perception. It doesn't say this is an airplane. It's just that a sound is heard. The second level is, I hear a sound, and it's the sound of an airplane. And then the third level is, this is simplification, right? The third level is, and airplanes are big things with wings, and they're mechanics, and they come from airports, and people fly in them, and so forth.

[71:06]

So there are various developments of consciousness. The first one, just bare perception of just hearing the sound, or seeing the wall. In zazen, there's just seeing the wall. And sometimes you say to yourself, geez, I've had my eyes open and seeing the wall, but I don't remember seeing the wall. Because there's no cognitions, not creating a memory factor. So those are kind of three levels of perception. And they're all necessary, but often we lose the first one. The kind of vital perception was just here's something as it is before naming it. And the more we

[72:07]

think about it, the more we add on to it, the more removed we are. Because all perception happens in the mind. And we create a picture. And we say, well, I'm looking at you. But actually, we're looking at a picture in our own mind that corresponds to I'm looking at you. But I mean, when I'm looking at you, I am looking at you. But actually, I'm really looking at a picture of you in my own mind. And my mind distorts the picture in all kinds of ways. If you're walking down the street, you know, then you see yourself in the window of the store. And you say, who's that? And then you think, oh, I know who that is. And then you look again. Oh, let's see. Then we try to see the picture that we want to see. Most of the time, we try to see the picture. When we look in the mirror, it's really hard to see the picture that's there because we want to see, we look at the picture that we want to see.

[73:16]

It's easy to change, you know, it changes right away. Doesn't that mean that my alaya, your alaya is the same as my alaya? Could that mean that I could suffer the karma contribution from someone else's act? No. That's right. It's not so. Each one's alaya consciousness is their own. And no one's karma can be transferred to anybody else. It's individual consciousness. But that's why this is important. Because beyond the individual consciousness is buddha nature consciousness. There has to be a place where everything meets, finally.

[74:16]

It's not a matter of meeting, but it's... If you think about the Big Bang, let's say the Big Bang happened You know, and there was once this little bit of matter, you know, and it blew up into all these things. But still everything, the ancestor of all these things is this little bit of matter. Or whatever, or something. But it's difficult to talk about because as soon as you start talking about it, then you start talking about something behind something. And in Zen practice, you know, Zen understanding. This is why we have koans, because koans don't explain. As soon as you start explaining, then you start falling into duality, into talking about something behind something else. So, that's where we get to this. That's why the circles are, you know, we can talk about, just by looking at the circles, you

[75:29]

can understand this amala side, which is the absolute side, and all of these consciousnesses, which are the relative side. So, in Buddhism, it's really important to not fall into creationism, that something was created by a deity. It's real easy to fall into that, and Buddhism almost does, in a lot of ways, especially in the Vijnanavada, where consciousness, talking about consciousness, sometimes people say that Bhairatana is like God. Or Mahler consciousness is like God.

[76:39]

And it's not that there's anything against that, it's just that that's not... It's too easy. So the idea that there was a beginning? No. No beginning and no end. Well, then that's not taken care of. It does, but you know... But also to say no beginning, no end is also not right. That's the problem. Whatever you say, it's a problem. It's easy to say something. It's not easy to say something. It's really easy to have a great definition and a great solution. But the solution, every time you have the right solution, you have to toss it away because it's only a solution. And so we, you know, in Buddhism we always keep reaching deeper and deeper rather than falling into some solution. Somehow I keep thinking about survival.

[77:49]

That the purpose of all, you know, I'm looking for a function of all this is survival. And that there's some delusion, we really believe and discernment and separation, does that instantly call forth survival and the delusion of personal survival? Well, yeah, that's why, you know, people talk about rebirth and reincarnation, things like that, right? Well, that's a whole other subject, although it's connected. Because in Buddhism, we say, no birth and no death. And so what is it that, you know, one of the, well, we're getting a little bit away from this, you know, and I'm real tempted to just go right into that, but I won't. Let's take your attention.

[78:55]

Bill? Yes, I have a question. Manas, does that also mean suffering in some way? Well, yeah, of course, yeah. What is it that suffers? That's what suffers. It's our ego that suffers, right? But the translation also can be translated fairly literally as suffering? Well, it depends on, you know, all of these terms have different names and different systems. So, this is one model, right? It's just a model. And in this model we call it manas. And in some other model you might call it suffering. But we should stick with the model. Where is the observer? Where is the observer? Well,

[80:02]

Mind consciousness is the observer. The eye, ear, nose, tongue, and touch are the doorways, right? And the mind, they all meet in the mind, and the mind observes, the mind records, the thinking mind records the information. So we say observe applies to the eye. We also can observe through our ear or observe through our nose. But the nose, these are just organs, right? So there has to be one, there has to be a doorway, right? And there has to be a consciousness and there has to be an object that's discerned. Number six observes number seven. Seven sees in a different way.

[81:08]

Seven sees as self-consciousness, but mind without mindness just sees as it is. So mindness is a kind of distorting consciousness, but it's just perception. is through the six consciousnesses. I can hardly hear you. Six can observe number seven. Oh, yeah. Yeah, six can observe number seven. You know, thinking mind observes everything. Of course, there's a limitation. Because the limitation is that we only have these senses.

[82:13]

Some other animal may have a different sense. And we're not always aware of the various kinds of senses that other beings have, actually. But we're limited through eye, ear, nose, tongue, and touch, and thinking. we're limited, that's our limitation in this world, and so that's why it's hard to understand the universe because we can only understand it through the doorways that we have, through the, you know, an imagination. What is intuition? Intuition, strictly speaking, means directly seeing. Without, it means without going through the medium of some other something else. Yeah, mere wisdom is intuition. It's seeing as it is, without an intermediary. When you're doing Zazen, you're watching your mind chatter away, what's watching it?

[83:17]

Mind is just chattering. Yeah, but I can mind is watching itself? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, mind is the observer. Yeah. Yeah, it does You don't have to. Drink your coffee and be in the middle of traffic and listen to your radio. Talk on the phone. You can do lots of things at once. Are you doing all those things at once or just switching around between them? We're always doing lots of things at once. Do you ever think that there's any one activity that you do that's just one thing?

[84:20]

That's the closest you come to doing one thing at once. That's not even close. That's right. One thing is a combination of things. You know, every one thing. But the one thing is our focus. To do one thing, it's when our attention is focused on a certain activity and all the different things that we're doing participate in that one activity. But doing one thing means thousands of activities are being focused on what we think of as one activity. But there is no one activity. But yet, there is one activity. But the one activity takes a tremendous amount of cooperating activities to make that one activity happen. For me, it would be better to say, these are eight aspects of consciousness rather than eight consciousnesses.

[85:37]

Well, yes, you can say either way. There are eight aspects of consciousness. That's right. But then I think that statement is coming from a lie. Which statement? The statement I just made. Consciousness. Yeah, that's right, there are eight aspects. But they're usually spoken of as eight consciousnesses. Back to this one activity at a time, or many activities. I think I've heard it explained that there's only one input at a time. For instance, you may get eye, ear. Well, there's one thing that's dominating. really separate things occurring, they almost appear simultaneous, but they're really not simultaneous.

[86:39]

Is that what you're explaining? Well, there are things that are simultaneous. And what would be an example of that? I don't know. Hearing and seeing. But I'm saying they're all touch, right? So, don't you receive one at a time, and they appear simultaneous? You can get it down to the point where you could probably say that there's only one thing, Perception and time happen. You can probably get it. But for practical purposes, we hear and see at the same time. Simultaneously. And also cause and effect is also simultaneous. It can be simultaneous. So there is simultaneity, as well as each thing. But what is the thing? As soon as you start taking apart a thing, what is the perception?

[87:42]

You can keep taking it apart, and the more you take it apart, you see that there's myriad activities in one teeny-weeny perception. I guess I'm saying there's one effect at a time, and then that turns into a perception. Several of them, or many, many of them, turn into a perception. I don't know about that. I mean, it's just sort of drinking a cup of tea or something, the touch, which is always there if you want to be aware of just the feel of the cup at the same time you're touching it. Right. You can feel it exactly the same time. That's a little different. Yeah. But anyway, that whole argument is a little digressive. Is what? A little digressive. I want to get on to the next two. It's afternoon. I guess we'll have to do this next time, finish it next time, but it's worth it to go over this some more.

[88:54]

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