Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. A live translation puzzle gives this 45-minute commentary its most memorable moment: Geshe Pema Tsering discovers mid-session that a single Tibetan word — Tenma — can mean either “characteristic” or “limit,” causing genuine confusion over how to number the subdivisions of “application in skillful means.” Once resolved, he works through the definition — effortless bodhisattva activity that benefits all beings — and its subdivisions: victory over the four maras, existing conventionally but not ultimately (avoiding the extremes of nihilism and eternalism), acting by force of previous prayers, and three aspects of emptiness covering phenomena themselves, their causes, and their results. The session ends with a pointed explanation of “wishlessness”: since results lack inherent existence, the ordinary craving for things to be truly real should simply be let go. For practitioners working through this advanced Mahāyāna commentary.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 04 ST9 2003 09 18.mp3
UUID: eb94e9bf-50c6-46d1-bbb6-86802f9a1c50
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Seventy Topics (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2003-09-18
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 45.1 minutes
Words: ~2,344
Okay. So it it’s not like Earth because Earth or this place that we are has been has come into being on the by the power of our collective karma, by the power of all our individual karma. Because something has come into being by negative karma, some negative karma and some positive karma, it has developed into a place that isn’t as pure. The place that these beings develop that they generate is completely pure because it comes from completely pure karma or action. Okay.
So the next one, the number eleven, is application in skillful means. And the definition of application in skillful means is yoga of the pure grounds which spontaneously accomplish enlightened activities which in Tibetan is Trinli, yeah, in a manner of the of effortless exertion. And Geshe la said, no, Trinley — he’s a guy that lives somewhere in Adelaide and then he said, no, no no no, it means that the activities of the Buddha that are of benefit to all beings. So at this stage these bodhisattva because they have reached that stage of development they don’t have to put in very much effort at all in order to be of immense benefit to all beings they just they have to put in a little bit of effort but it’s nothing and actually incredibly happy about doing that so what this means is that they can do anything in order to help beings if that means giving away their arm or their leg or their head or whatever it is they’re really really happy about it because their bodhicitta is so developed that they can do any of these things without much effort and no hardship. Okay, so the first division of the application in skillful means is application in skillful means, which is victorious over the four maras.
The Maras are different types of klesha or afflictive emotions, whatever you want to call it. There are four different types. The Maras of the sons of gods, the Mara’s of aggregates, the Mara’s of afflictive emotions themselves and the Mara of death or the Lord of death. Okay. The next one, application in skillful means which abides abides conventionally and does not abide ultimately.
Now what this means is that by abiding conventionally means that exists conventionally and not abiding ultimately means that it doesn’t exist ultimately so that is to say that it is not a non existence and it doesn’t fall into extreme of nihilism because it abides conventionally but it’s not an inherently existent or a truly existent thing because it doesn’t abide ultimately and hence it doesn’t fall into the extreme of eternalism. The next one is the application of skillful means which enacts the welfare of others impelled by the force of previous prayers so up until this point these bodhisattvas have been put have said or have had the conviction of many many different prayers and aspirations in order to be a benefit to sentient beings they are trying to achieve enlightenment to be a benefit to sentient beings so by the force of all these prayers, by the force of all these aspiration they are now able to enact or do things for the benefit of others. These prayers have come to fruition and they are able to act, by the power of those prayers, for the benefit of all sentient beings.
The next one, the application in skillful means which is not shared. What that means is, like it says in brackets, hearers and solitary realizers don’t have it. It’s very peculiar to bodhisattvas. It’s like, you don’t stop there, I’ll stop there. Okay, now the next one application in skillful means which is without a nature of attachment to true existence with respect to all phenomena this means not perceiving the true existence of all phenomena or in other words perceiving that all phenomena are not truly existent, right?
So it’s that understanding of emptiness or emptiness of true existence that is talking about number five Now number six: the application in skillful means which does not observe true existence. Right? Another way of saying this is that It’s something hang on. I’ve got something weird happening. I just you have to bear with me for a second.
Okay, okay, we’ve got it. Alright, the first one now. There’s three, yeah? Five, six and seven This is weird.
Remember, I remember trying to figure it out. Four. Five. Five. Okay.
Five. Like, this yeah. I did I looked at this before, and I thought that doesn’t make sense. And then I then I thought it made sense, and now it stopped making sense again. Okay.
Six does not observe true existence. There’s one. Okay. I’m sorry. I’ve just spent ages going, what’s going on?
And they’ve missed out one in the Tibetan. So could you imagine how much that will do your head It’s just going, where’s that one? Was that one there all the same? It’s not there. Anyway, not shared with hearers and solitary realizers.
No. No. That one’s in there. The one application in skillful means which is signless isn’t. Okay.
Alright guys, sorry about all that, it was just really confusing. Okay, so we have three that come together. The first one is number five: Application in skillful means which is without a nature of attachment to true existence with respect to all phenomena. Now the nature of something is the thing itself. So this is talking about the things themselves not being attached to the true existence of the things themselves The next one where it says the application in skillful means which does not observe true existence because it’s talking about observing an object, the object that is actually referring to is the object of true existence.
So the first one is the thing itself, the second one, it says does not observe true existence, it’s saying it does not observe the object of true existence, object of true existence referring to the object of true existence, alright? They’ve left out the object of in the translation. The next one application in skillful means which is signless. What this is referring to is their result. The sign is like the result of phenomena so the result is said to be lacking true existence as well so this application or this yoga, this practice sees all three things as being not truly existent So that’s five, six, seven.
Yes. Sorry about this. Sorry. K. She was describing it saying it’s ten and describing it as nine and then telling me that the and then then he’s trying to do it with this, and I was just like, what?
Okay, okay, okay. This is what’s happened, right? Okay. There’s a word that can mean sign in Tibetan that if you take the end off it means Okay. Great.
We did actually prepare, believe it or not. Okay. Right. Now, apparently, in the in the root text here, Okay. Alright.
So, anyway, we’ll try again. Okay. Now, number five, six, and eight are what I said before. Right? So number five is the thing itself.
It’s talking about application of seeing that as empty. Number six is seeing the causes as empty. Now, number eight is seeing the result as empty, hence it’s called wishless. Geshe la said that the word that they’ve translated as signless here should actually be called edge or the limit So so it’s talking about the the the the end of it, if you know what I mean, like the the What do call it before? Yeah.
See how this translation. Oh, yeah. Oh, really? Okay. Yeah.
He’s saying it’s like the he always said it’s the application in skillful means which refers to limitlessness. Okay. Geshe la said that it can have both these things mean the same thing, yeah? You can say because it says in one place in the root text it says one thing and in the other one it says another, right? And he said that they’re the same it’s a different way of describing the same thing.
You can say something doesn’t have a boundary or something doesn’t have a characteristic. It’s just like saying it’s a different way of describing the same thing. Okay. Yeah. It’s yeah.
Sorry. This is the it’s this there’s one word in Tibetan, Tenma. The other one’s Tenma. Can you hear the difference? One means a characteristic, the other one means a limit.
Yes, so as in the limitless, the four limitless things. So both of these can be used to describe something lacking inherent existence because we can say if something doesn’t like an inherent existence it doesn’t have it lacks inherent existence it doesn’t have an edge you can also say if it lacks inherent existence that it lacks characteristics alright now in the original in the root text it says limitless in the commentary it says characterless Characterless. Yeah.. Yeah.
Yeah. Okay. God. I’m I think I’m a just walked into a translator nightmare. Because number ten is limitless or immeasurable.
No. It’s the same word. You know? Yep. Oh, okay.
Okay, I’m gonna have to change it now. Think we’ve got it. Alright? Sorry, because it was completely confusing because all the words sounded the same and it was all different in there one to the other. Geshe-la says he thinks that true existence and signless, yeah, that not observed true existence and signless are the same thing.
Yeah? So they were referring to the cause. Okay? And then the wishless one is the result and the respect to all phenomena at number five, right? Is the thing itself.
Number six four. Six and seven. Above, the four. Yeah. And number eight is the result.
I did. I did I was so confused. Yes. And signless means signless. It means characterless, yeah?
And there’s another way of describing it, when it says immeasurable, it’s saying the same thing, it’s saying the emptiness of something, but that’s number ten, it’s not number six or seven, sorry. Does that make sense? I’m sorry. I was so I got completely befuddled. Somebody can without boundaries, but it’s not being benefit.
It’s the same word. It just means you can’t for instance. There’s no boundaries. A what? A gas doesn’t Yes, it does.
At the edge of the molecules. Yeah. Yeah. But if there’s no molecule there, there’s no gas. No outer limit.
Sure. Yeah. But from yeah. When can’t even think of how to describe that. Geshe la said for something to be boundaryless means that there can be nothing bigger than it.
For you to say that gas doesn’t have a boundary means that you would say that nothing can be bigger than it. That definition, this particular definition. Yeah, this one means that. It’s used to describe immense things. It’s the same word as when they talk about the four immeasurables but in that instance it means profundity as opposed to geographical space does that make sense That was like me being in a maze and trying to find my hand.
So from this perspective, gas does have a boundary because it can’t exist outside, for example, the earth’s atmosphere. Someone else have a question hey uh-huh yeah Okay, so, talking about the result. It goes through the thing itself, its cause, and then it speaks lastly of the result. Now, the reason that they use the word wishless or hopeless is because this result doesn’t exist. Yeah?
No, a cause will a result will arise but it won’t be an inherently existent cause it’s an inherently existent result yeah so because it’s not inherently existent yeah okay yeah it’s not inherently existent therefore it’s called wishless yeah So the reason that they use this word is so that by focusing on different words we can have different ideas about emptiness that can help us bring us closer to emptiness. So the idea of wishlessness helps us understand emptiness better. Because he said ordinary beings we have to have hang on first of I’ll try to say what he said first we have to have these different words to focus on to try and get through so we can understand emptiness better, yeah? So they use different words in order to give different ideas into our minds in order to focus on emptiness now the reason this word wishless or hopeless is used is because we as ordinary beings have the hope or the desire for things to be truly existent because as it because we have the hope for desire to have things to be truly existent we act in that way so this is saying that there is no result that can come about that will be truly existent so give up hope, give up hope, give up the wish?
Yeah he doesn’t have a hope, doesn’t have a prayer okay, now the word for prayer in Tibetan is mönlam as in Jampa Mönlam, the word for aspiration or hope or wish is “mön” (Tib.), so that’s why he’s put that — the concept of prayer is to have the path of aspiration — translation, alright? So, Geshe la said it may be a strange way of putting it but it gives you the idea because he said that prayers are not inherently existent either so, is wishes or praying or anything like that referring to that will give you the idea he said but don’t think of it as being like the practice you have to do it’s not that I think that was very poetic of him. I’m impressed. Any other questions? I’m sorry.
Sorry about that mix up with your numbers. I was completely baffled. No? He he reckons you’re trying to figure out what to ask. Trying to think of a a good way to write down your answer for that Uh-huh.
About. It’s, yeah, it’s tricky. It’s two tricky words that don’t quite fit. Yeah. Yeah.
Not being a mind reader. Yeah. Yeah.