Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Kyabje Rinpoche distinguishes two Madhyamaka schools in this 46-minute session, using the magician’s illusion and rope-snake analogies to expose how we falsely grasp at true existence. He contrasts Autonomy Middle Way—where phenomena are naturally existent—with Prāsaṇgika, where all things exist through imputation by awareness alone. Through examples of flowers, hands, persons, and the Prime Minister, he shows why grasping at inherent existence is fundamental error. He concludes by outlining three characteristics that qualify proper imputation. For practitioners with foundational Middle Way knowledge.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1991-05-23 – 11B – KR.mp3
UUID: d1f49119-f99c-4ee0-8df6-53592701d41d
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Entering the Middle Way
Date: 1991-05-23
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~2,417
But to for the audience, it appears that the horse and elephant are coming the existence of the horse elephant exists from its own side. That is to say that from the side of the stone and the wood there is the appearance of a horse and elephant. But to the audience, the audience is conceiving of that horse and elephant not to be being posited by the force of their own conception, but in fact the horse and elephant are existing from this side of the stone and the wood, not dependent upon being conceived as from their own side, as being posited from their own side as a horse and elephant, from their own uncommon objective existence. Uncommon objective existence. But the magician understands that there is no fully qualified horse coming from the side of the stone and stick by itself.
That there is no fully qualified horse without his own conception, without depending upon his own awareness, positing the existence of that horse and elephant. So there is no conception that this is really a horse and an elephant. The audience is grasping at the horse and elephant which does not exist by merely being imputed, but exists, but the horse and elephant are held or grasped to exist from their own side of the object, with uncommon mode of objective establishment, there arises an awareness which grasps at this way of establishing as being the way the horse and the elephant really exist, and this is a wrong conception. So the grasping at the horse and the elephant to be not being posited by the force of awareness, but to be existing purely from the side of the object is to posit a truly existing horse. That is to say, there horse is held to be real, existing from its own side without being posited by the force of awareness.
So the horse, which is the fully qualified horse, objectively existing from the side of the object without being posited by the force of awareness is the analogy of true existence. That awareness which grasps and thinks that this is in fact a horse is the conception of true existence. So we take the take the flower as an example. The the the So there is the awareness which grasps at the existence of the flower as being not posited by means of terms, but in fact the flower is established objectively from its own uncommon mode of existence. As in the of horse and elephant, is the awareness grasping at the true existence of the flower?
So just as in the case of the fully qualified horse. So, if we speak of true existence in terms of the flower, so the truly existent flower is the flower which exists by way of its uncommon objective mode of subsistence, and is not designated by terms. The flower which is established by way of its own uncommon mode of subsistence and is not designated by terms. It is the truly existent flower. And the awareness which grasps at this existence is the conception of true existence.
The awareness which grasps at the the flower being established by way of its uncommon mode of subsistence is the conception of true existence of the flower. So as we’ve discussed, there is no flower which is being established from its own side without being posited by terms. Without being posited by terms, is no flower exists. So the Autonomy Middle Way School posits that all phenomena do not truly exist. And the way they if we understand this analogy of the magician, then this will facilitate coming to understand what they mean by true existence and the conception of true existence.
So, through this easy example did you did you understand understand it? So this autonomy middle way school analogy of the magician is really excellent. The Consequentialist Middle Way school doesn’t make use of the magician. Make use of the analogy of the snake imputed to a striped rope. So presenting this analogy that there is a coiled striped rope, but because it is almost dark, it’s very dim light.
And when the eye sees this, there arises a thought snake. There’s a snake, and fear arises. So, by the force of conceiving, the person conceives of a snake. He thinks there’s a snake, there’s a snake there. Where does it conceive the snake?
At the place of its striped rope. From the side of the object there there is nothing there which is a snake. You know, that all of the various, all the fibers of the rope, the colors, the shape, that none of these parts whatsoever is the snake. There’s nothing about that object whatsoever which is a snake. There’s nothing about the object whatsoever which is a snake.
The snake is merely being imputed to the collection of those parts, merely being imputed to the collection of those parts. There’s nothing there which is a snake. So if we take the, in the case of the flower, the flower is merely being imputed. That it is being imputed in dependence upon the collection of parts. For example, the petals of the flower, the stem of the flower, the white, the red, the colors of the flower.
Taking all these various parts together, this collection, in dependence upon that, the flower is imputed, designated, is projected onto that collection. Just like the snake is imputed to the rope, the snake exists dependent upon that rope, the flower exists dependent upon the collection of the parts. All phenomena are exist in the exact same manner. For example, the table. The table is imputed dependent upon the collection of its parts.
Likewise, ourselves as a person. The person is merely designated, imputed, to the collection of the five aggregates. If we were to go through all of this collection, then none of the parts are the person, the shape is not the person, none of the individual aggregates are the person, the collection of the parts are not the person. The person, none of these are the person. That the person is merely designated, projected, labeled onto the collection of these five aggregates.
That these five aggregates are the basis of designation. And Then upon that the person is merely labeled, upon that collection, just like in the same exact way in which the rope is merely labeled. The snake is merely labeled to a rope. So it is from this presentation that we can begin to see that there is a degree of subtlety with respect to the view of the Autonomy Middle Way and the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka schools. Do you see that is there a difference degree of the view?
Both the Autonomy Middle Way and the Consequentialist Middle Way say that phenomena are imputed. They both hold that position. Autonomy Middle Way School says that the the existence of this phenomena is established by means of an element which a slight element coming from the side of the object in combination with the awareness imputing the object. So there is a slight factor coming from the side of the object, in addition to being imputed by the awareness. In terms of the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school, there is nothing whatsoever coming from the side of the object.
Not even the slightest atom of a factor coming from the side of the object. That the object is completely coming from the side of the subject. That it’s merely, only imputed by awareness. There’s nothing whatsoever coming from the side of the object. For the, if an object even has a slight factor coming from the side of the object, then it is objectively established, inherently established.
But the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school says nothing is objectively established, nothing inherently established. There is nothing whatsoever coming from the side of the object, from its own side. So the autonomy and Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka schools agree that nothing truly exists. But the autonomy of middle way schools assert that though things do not truly exist, they still objectively exist.
That they naturally exist, that they inherently exist. That because things that aren’t truly existent doesn’t mean that they aren’t self defining, that they don’t exist from their own side, that objects do inherently exist within themselves. But for the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school, all of these various ways of being established, whether it’s truly existent, naturally existent, objectively established, inherently established, inherently existent, all mean the same thing, and none of them exist. So then the Autonomy Middle Way School, what do they mean by natural existence? They say that for them, existence is definability of the object upon ultimate analysis.
The findability of the object upon ultimate analysis is what they mean by natural existence. So the Autonomy Middle Way School asserts that the person is naturally existent. This means that if they were to search for the person, they should be able to find it. And proceeding in their analysis, they’re searching for the person, going through, they say, Well, the form is not the person, the legs, the feeling. What they do assert is that the mental consciousness is the person.
Therefore, having found the object for which they are searching, it must naturally exist. Self defining. Why do they assert that the mental consciousness is the person or the being? It is because it is the mental consciousness which is the taker of rebirth, and therefore it is the being which is the taker of rebirth. Therefore, the mental consciousness is the taker of birth, the mental consciousness must be the person or the being.
So again, performing analysis upon the hand, trying to search for the hand which is designated. Where is the hand? And they would go through, This is not the hand, this is not the hand, this is not the fingers. Fingers are not, each of the fingers is not the hand. The palm is not the hand.
Well, what is the hand? It is the collection of all these parts which is the hand. So, you should consider why they posit natural existence because they feel that if for a phenomena to exist, it must be able to be found upon searching for it, analysis. So, if upon analysis you cannot find the object, then it must not exist. And they say that upon analysis, upon searching for the object, will be able to find it.
Therefore, it must naturally exist. But on the other hand, the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school refutes natural existence. They say that nothing upon being searched for can be found. Upon analysis, the object is not found. For example, the collection of the parts of the hand is not the hand.
That the mental consciousness is not the person. Upon analysis, the object which is imputed is not found, therefore it does not naturally exist. There’s a great debate between With respect to the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school, for them, true existence, the measure of true existence, would be that an object which is not merely imputed by terms and conception, an object which exists not by means of merely being imputed by terms and conception is a truly existent object. The grasping, the conception which grasps at that existence is the conception of true existence. So that’s the difference.
So we’ll stop there if we have have questions. Common, and then uncommon that it’s not dependent upon being imputed. And then I questioned the Autonomy Middle School, the basis of the imputation exists prior before the phenomena which is imputed. And in the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school, the basis of imputation and the phenomena imputed are coming to existence simultaneously. The basis of the imputation according to the Autonomy Middle Way School is the collection.
That’s the basis of the imputation, and that exists prior to being designated. That’s what’s coming from of the object. Simultaneously. What is it? Is that a question?
So what is your question? For example? Well, we all agree that something this has got flowers on. Take a flower, for example. Parts of the flower were not naturally existent and we couldn’t come to call it a flower.
We could call anything anything? The objection you’re voicing is an objection which is put forth by the Autonomy Middle Way School. They say that there must be something coming from the side of the object. Otherwise, we could pile up a bunch of stones and say that’s a person. If there’s nothing coming from the side of the object then we can call a pile of stones a person.
You’re making a big mistake. Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school says that all phenomena are indeed merely imputed. But in order that they be imputed in the way that they are, there must be three characteristics satisfied. Characteristics which must be satisfied is that the object must be able to perform the function as imputed. The second is that the imputed object is not refuted a valid cognition apprehending worldly conventions.
And the third characteristic, it must not be refuted by a valid cognition which is apprehending the ultimate, that is to say emptiness. If it satisfies these three characteristics, then it’s a properly imputed object. To illustrate this, we take the Prime Minister of Australia. First the Prime Minister voted upon, somebody wins the most votes, and that person in combination with having the ability to be Prime Minister has received the most votes, is then becomes is able to perform the function of Prime Minister, is able to perform the function. The first characteristic is that this person is able to perform the function.
They, I don’t know what they do in Australia. They have an enthronement. They install the Prime Minister. He takes office. And they give him the title, You are now the Australian Prime Minister.
He’s given that title. Previous to being given the title, had the ability to perform the function, be able to perform the function, but he was not the Prime Minister yet. He had the ability to perform function and then one day they gave him the title of Prime Minister. If we were to call you the Prime Minister of Australia, then a valid cognition apprehending worldly conventions would be able to refute that. You know in the world as actual Prime Minister.
They say, Oh, she’s not really the Prime Minister. Above. Above. Alright.