Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 45-minute teaching, Geshe Dhawa Gyaltsen explores how different Buddhist philosophical schools understand selflessness and valid perception. After grounding the listener in the three principal paths—renunciation, bodhicitta, and right view—he walks through the four types of direct valid perception, emphasizing the yogic direct perceiver that arises in advanced meditation. The heart of the session compares the schools’ accounts: Vaibhāṣika and Sautrāntika on the selflessness of persons; Cittamātra’s addition of selflessness of phenomena; and Madhyamaka’s further refinement. He also clarifies the distinction between gross and subtle impermanence. Suited to serious practitioners with foundation knowledge of Buddhist philosophy.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 07 Lo Rig.mp3
UUID: 5dafafaf-4839-4c66-acb2-22c332cc161f
Teacher: Geshe Dhawa Gyaltsen
Collection: Nature of the Mind (Geshe Dhawa Gyaltsen)
Date: 1995 (exact day not recorded)
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.9 minutes
Words: ~2,042
So as Nāgārjuna explains in his teachings, saying that the text so-called the Precious Garland, where he explains that through the accumulation of merit, one achieves the form body — the Rūpakāya. And then secondly, through the accumulation of wisdom, one achieves the state of Dharmakāya, that is the truth body. And for example, looking to Buddha Śākyamūni himself — his achievement of the enlightened state is not without any cause. And how he achieved it — all that he has achieved is through these two accumulations as a cause. That is the accumulation of wisdom and the accumulation of merit.
And all the teachings that Buddha gave are in two aspects: in the aspect of method and in the aspect of wisdom. Which is given for one person to achieve the full enlightened state. And because of that, from one side what one should do is apply both the method aspect and the wisdom aspect in one’s practice. And these — the method aspect and wisdom aspect — are like: the teachings on bodhicitta are the method aspect, and the teachings on right view or emptiness are the wisdom aspect of the teachings. And in order to generate these two within our mental continuum — a pure one — one first needs to generate the thought of renunciation within oneself.
So because if one doesn’t have the thought of renunciation within oneself, then there’s, what do you say, very little possibility for generating the great compassion within oneself. Because — yeah. So because of that, the thought of renunciation is very important for oneself. So these two bodies — the form body and the truth body, the Rūpakāya and the Dharmakāya — to achieve these two bodies, one needs to practice bodhicitta and the right view, the emptiness. So because of that, all the essential points of the path are within these three principal paths.
Is yeah. Within these three principal paths. So this — the three principal paths — that is what Lama Tsongkhapa received from Mañjuśrī. The lineage of these three practices has great blessings. So one should generate a pure thought of renunciation within oneself — which here pure means not only, I would say, recognizing the sufferings that one goes through, but also seeing the suffering of others, other mothers and children. And seeing that and generating this thought: I am listening to this teaching in order to achieve the full enlightened state, to free all sentient beings from sufferings.
So beside that, also add in your motivation that wishing to lead all sentient beings to the state of happiness. So to do that — to lead all sentient beings to the state of happiness — one needs to know how one leads those sentient beings. So for that purpose, I listen to the teaching. So that kind of motivation you generate. So now we go back to the text.
That is, last time we talked about the direct valid perceivers. And there are four kinds. That is the self-knowing direct perceiver, and then the mental direct valid perceiver, and then sense direct valid perceiver, and then yogic direct valid perceiver. These four that we are talking about.
And then today mainly we talk about the fourth one. That is the yogic direct valid perceiver. So, yogic direct valid perceiver — as a meaning or as a definition — it is a direct realization of the subtle impermanence and the selflessness of the person — the gross and the subtle selflessness of the person — in the continuum of ārya beings, like superior beings, which is produced from a concentration that is the union of calm abiding and special insight. So then if you divide, there are three divisions within this yogic direct valid perceiver.
That is: one kind of yogic direct valid perceiver is that yogic direct valid perceiver realizing the subtle impermanence. That’s one kind. And the second kind is that of yogic direct valid perceiver perceiving or realizing the gross selflessness. And then the third is that of yogic direct valid perceiver perceiving the subtle selflessness. So the subtle impermanence — the explanations of subtle impermanence within the four schools of Buddhist thought — has no difference.
So the gross and the subtle impermanence — the gross impermanence is that which is explained in the Abhidharmakośa. This is known as the gross type of impermanence, and then the subtle impermanence is that which is explained in the Prāsaṇgika view. That is what the subtle impermanence is. So the impermanence explained in the four noble truths — that’s like the sixteen attributes, the first one being impermanence. The explanation of that impermanence is the same in all the schools.
But then the rest of the attributes — among the sixteen, the rest — I don’t know how to say — are explained differently in different schools. Different explanations given. So, like, in the small scope, we meditate on impermanence. And that meditation on impermanence is known as gross impermanence.
So if one is to have the realization of this subtle impermanence, then that forces one to do the practice. You don’t waste your time. So then this selflessness — the gross and the subtle selflessness — these selflessnesses are different, a little different, among the different schools. So in the schools that don’t accept the selflessness of phenomena, they accept there’s a self, or truly existing phenomena. So they don’t accept the selflessness of phenomena.
So within the Vaibhāṣika, the subtle and the gross selflessness is within the person. So gross selflessness of a person is — what do you say — the nonexistence of a permanent, single, independent person. That is what is used as an example for gross selflessness. And then for the subtle selflessness within the Vaibhāṣika school, that is the nonexistence of a self-sufficient or substantially existing person.
So like the first part — the gross selflessness of a person — there are three points: one being permanent, secondly being single, and then third which is that of independent. There are these three points. So what is meant by permanent here is that which is existing but not having the aspect of disintegration. That is what is known as permanent, sorry. So here, and then the second — like single — which means not depending on its parts.
And then independent person is like — for the person to exist, it doesn’t have to depend on anything. So like as a person — a person is lacking these three. It is not permanent, not single, not independent. Because of that aspect, it is used as an example of the gross selflessness. So then going to the second, which is subtle selflessness.
Self-sufficient here means not depending on other things. So then substantially existing also means like — the substance here is like a separate substance, which has the same meaning as self-sufficient, like self-sufficient substance. So, like — so self-sufficient, substantially existing things, like, such as consciousness. Consciousness are like self-sufficient and substantially existing.
So as — but as a — and what is meant by self-sufficient and substantially existing is that which doesn’t have to depend on other things for it to exist. So the consciousness is, like, self-sufficient or substantially existing. But the person is not, like, self-sufficient or substantially existing. Because for the person to exist, it has to depend on something. So for a person to exist, it has to depend on something — which is, for example, the aggregates.
Yeah. The five aggregates. Oh, yeah. So then the next is that of — so in Sautrāntika school and Vaibhāṣika school, the explanations of selflessness — the presentation of selflessness, the subtle and the gross selflessness — are the same, and they are also both — they don’t accept the selflessness of phenomena.
So then the third school — the Cittamātra — the view of selflessness of the person is similar to that of the two lower ones, that of Vaibhāṣika and Sautrāntika. But then there are differences of subtleness and grossness. So the difference between the two lower schools — that of Vaibhāṣika and Sautrāntika — and Cittamātra: Cittamātra asserts the selflessness of phenomena. And that is what the two lower schools don’t assert.
So within how Cittamātra explains selflessness of phenomena — that is: how do you say? That is the non-existence of object and subject as one entity, and non-existence of external phenomena. So these will be more explained, yeah. We’ll be getting more explanation. One example is that the form, or the object, doesn’t exist to the consciousness which is apprehending it. This one.
So then the object and subject are like having the same entity — like having the same entity — which is — they accept this object and subject having the same entity. So they accept the entities of subject and object as one. So because of that, it lacks different entities. Subject and object lack being different entities. So in Cittamātra school, they posit one entity for both the object and the subject.
Like object as a form and the object perceiver as a subject — as one entity. Like the form, and so on — the five sense objects — exist or are produced from one imprint. Like produced from one imprint, yeah. So how they keep the imprints is that through the mind basis of all — that mind — one leaves one imprint there. So then when these imprints manifest, it brings two things, it produces two things. That is one is the subject or the perceiver, and then secondly the object. It brings about the object.
So because of that, they say it has like subject and object having one entity. So then next is — so the non-existence of external things. So here, non-existing from external — as an external form — which is another way I put it — lack of external existence. That is like: if it exists independently, without depending on the internal consciousness, out there, then that is what the Cittamātra school accepts as existing externally. So this — object and subject having the same entity — that is the same as the object lacking external object.
So in order for an external object to exist, it has to depend on the internal consciousness, or on the imprints that are kept in the — so that is like the sort of that is the subtle selflessness of phenomena in that school. And then like the grosser — the gross selflessness of phenomena is that — so then the gross selflessness of phenomena in the Cittamātra view is: the lack of a gross form — the non-existence of gross form through collections of partless particles. That is what is known as the gross selflessness of phenomena. So in Cittamātra view, partless particles — like the very, very smallest atom which has no parts.
And if there’s one of that, then if you bring other partless particles together — even if you bring them together — there is no existence of gross form, because it doesn’t have parts. So it will never come together. So this partless particle — it’s like if we put it on the table here and then bring other four parts and try to make one object, a gross object — then that’s not possible in Cittamātra view. So because of that, there is the non-existence of a gross level of form through the collections of partless particles.
So then the next is that of the middle way school, or the Madhyamaka. And Madhyamaka — there are two. That is the Sautrāntika Madhyamaka and the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka. And so within the Sautrāntika Madhyamaka, there are again two divisions, two kinds. That is Sautrāntika Madhyamaka and then Yogachara Sautrāntika Madhyamaka — there are these two. So the Yogachara Sautrāntika Madhyamaka explains its view similar to that of Cittamātra.
So then the Sautrāntika Madhyamaka — they explain their view similar to that of the Sautrāntika school. So, yeah. So Yogachara Sautrāntika Madhyamaka — as a proponent of that school — is the master known as Shāntarakshita. And his presentation of the view is similar to that of the lower schools.