Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 48-minute session, Khensur Rinpoche examines a precise distinction between how hearers and bodhisattvas meditate on the four close establishments of mindfulness. After guiding a brief motivation — recognizing all sentient beings as former mothers and generating the aspiration to reach Buddhahood for their benefit — he identifies three ways the bodhisattva’s approach differs: the observed object extends to all beings, not just oneself; a fifth characteristic, phenomenal emptiness, is added to the standard four marks; and the aim is eliminating both obscurations for Buddhahood rather than personal liberation. Rinpoche then conducts a classroom-style examination, using the analogy of identifying a flower or recognizing a person by distinctive features to explain why practitioners need specific characteristics to identify an object and general characteristics to investigate its nature. He closes by introducing the distinction between analytic and stabilizing meditation. Best suited to practitioners with some grounding in Mahāyāna doctrine.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 05 IR 1990-10-07.mp3
UUID: e6bdb8c4-a34c-4433-a503-812df1eb0d76
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Insight Retreat (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1990-10-07
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 48.0 minutes
Words: ~2,570
That they should not move about a great deal, that they should not look about, they should not speak loudly, etcetera. And that they this in this this type of demeanor would, when it was seen by the the others, would cause would be a source of development of faith for them. The monks have many such disciplines. Beginning with the development of a kind heart, which is constituted of a compassion which wishes to free all sentient beings from the suffering, and a love which wishes to bring them happiness in all sentient beings, both myself and others. Others other sentient infinite number like infinite like space and numberless.
And we should seek to develop compassion toward all of these sentient beings because though they want happiness, they do not know the ways of creating the causes of happiness. And though they do not wish to experience suffering, they do not know how to abandon the causes of suffering. So we should appreciate the wonderful opportunity that each of us have in having attained a human life and an intent on the practice of Dharma that we understand the way in which to create the causes of happiness and the way to begin to abandon the causes of our suffering. And we should be mindful within the context of this wonderful opportunity that we all possess of the welfare of all sentient beings beings who have been our mothers, that these our mothers are numberless, and that each of them had has cared for us in the past just as our mother of this life has cared for us. And it’s a sad sentient beings are in a sad situation, not knowing the way to happiness and to free themselves from suffering, and we have to return the great kindness that they have shown us in the past.
And so we should, we have to develop the intention that I’m going to lead all of these sentient beings to happiness and free them from suffering. What can we do to bring them happiness, to free them from their suffering? We simply don’t have enough food and clothing to alleviate the the material deprivations that they experience, and even this would only serve to bring to be to be of temporal benefit. They have not really abandoned the the cause of their suffering in this way. Way.
What can I do to to be able to return the great kindness that sentient beings have shown me to to be able to benefit them in such a way that I can rid them of the root of their suffering and to to establish them in complete happiness? That in order to do that, I myself must become a Buddha. That having become a Buddha, then I can emanate hundreds and thousands of emanations to each and every sentient being, and that I can each of those emanations can lead the individual sentient beings into the path of the of liberation, into the path of Buddhahood. Therefore, I must myself rid myself of all my various faults and develop all my all my excellent qualities to the state of Buddhahood. And in order to achieve that end, I must train my mind in the great vehicle and implement all the various practices.
And we should spend the next five minutes cultivating the awakening heart as our motivation. according to the the verse by Vasubandhu in which the the manner of meditating on the four closed establishments of mindfulness. So with respect to the manner of meditation, as was mentioned previously, there are two. There’s a common manner and the exclusive manner of meditation, and we’re going to explain that. The common manner of meditation is with respect to the four observed objects of bodies, feelings, minds, and phenomena is that we we apply the the the general characteristics and the specific characteristics to each of them.
And we’ve we’ve finished the explanation of the common manner of meditation. With respect to the exclusive manner of meditation, this is exclusive way of to the bodhisattva. The previous manner, that of the common manner of meditation, was common to both the hearer and the bodhisattva. They used the same manner of meditation. But here, because of the greater intelligence the greater effort exerted by the bodhisattva, this way of meditating is exclusive to him or her.
So the exclusive manner of meditation is distinguished in terms of the observed object, the attention, and the attainment. The previous objects of observed object of the hearer was in terms of his own body, his own feelings, his own minds. It not an extensive object. So the observed object is much more extensive with respect to the exclusive manner of the bodhisattva. He not he observes not only his own body, but also in addition the bodies of other sentient beings.
And the same is true of observing the feelings of other sentient beings and the minds of other sentient beings. So in terms of the observed object, this manner of meditation is exclusive to the bodhisattva. With respect to the attention, the the hearer applies the general characteristics of impermanence, dissatisfactoriness, emptiness, and selflessness to his own body, etc. Aside from this, there is no other attention being made. But the the bodhisattva adds an an additional general characteristic, is not present in the application of the of the hearer.
I think mental application is another alternative translation for attention, an additional application. In addition to the hearer’s applications of impermanence, dissatisfactoriness, empty, and selflessness. The bodhisattva additionally has the fifth general characteristic of emptiness. So in in terms of the hearer’s manner of meditating these four characteristics, in terms of the empty and selfless, what is being referred to is the emptiness and selflessness of persons. That the person is empty of being of a substantially self-sufficient self.
But here, within the application of the great vehicle, the emptiness is applied to all phenomena, phenomenal emptiness or phenomenal selflessness, that all phenomena are empty. That’s the second in terms of the third exclusive manner of meditating, which is the attainment. The hearer meditates the four close establishments of mindfulness in order to free himself from his own contaminated body and and in order to attain a non contaminated body. This is his thinking or intention. But this is not the bodhisattva’s intention in meditating or the great vehicle intention for meditating.
The bodhisattva does not meditate the four close establishments of mindfulness simply to be free of the contaminated body. They do not meditate on the four close establishments in order to be free of a contaminated body. They meditate on these in order to abandon the two obscurations, the afflictive obscurations and the knowledge obscurations. And this in order to attain Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings, whereby they can eliminate all their various faults and bring to consummation all their excellent qualities. So this is the bodhisattva’s exclusive manner of meditating the four close establishments of mindfulness.
So there are these two manners of meditating. Meditation common and exclusive. We explained the common manner of meditation yesterday, and this is the exclusive manner of meditation. So because this man the manner of meditating of the four close establishments of mindfulness is of such great importance, we’re going to have like a some kind of examination and it creates some doubts that clear those up. So we should try to arouse some kinds of qualms concerning the the common manner of meditation.
So we begin the discussion of the common manner of meditation in terms of the observed object of the meditation. And in this case, it was the bodies, the feelings, the minds, the phenomena. Just as in the case of if I were examining this bill, I want to know, is this bill empty or not empty? Is it a good bill or is it a bad bill? I’m examining the bill.
The object of observation of the observed object is the bill. So the the basis of our examination is the are the four bodies, feelings, minds, and phenomena. So first, we must identify the basis of examination. For example, in the case of the flower, we must be able to identify the flower. Once we’ve recognized it, identified what it is we’re going to be examining, then we can begin to look at its qualities.
Does it have a nice color, poor color? Does it have a nice smell, a bad smell? But initially, we must recognize what is the basis of our examination and then begin to examine its qualities. Ask a question. Before we determine the quality of the flower, is it necessary that we be able to identify the flower?
Is it necessary to identify the flower? Do we have to? Yes. So the we must employ two methods. Two methods.
One is the identification of the flower and then the examining the qualities of the flower. So as was previously mentioned, we are examining the observed objects first of the body in terms of the two general characteristics, and the specific characteristics. And the same applies to the feelings, the minds, and the phenomena. So question. Why do we need to examine it in terms of both of these characteristics?
Why not just one of these characteristics? Yes. So it it what what does it refer to when you say it has some? The object. The.
Catch you. And they sending knee knee. So it’s true that that these objects have general and specific qualities. But still, that doesn’t necessarily mean that we have to examine both of them just because it has these. Why is it that we have to examine the object in terms of both the general and the specific characteristics?
Why why do we have to apply the general characteristics? That’s the necessity for the specific characteristics. Why the general characteristics? It’s quality. These things these things seem to be coming to you.
So we take as an analogy Jim and somebody what what’s Jim like? And he’s oh he has a long mustache and he has red hair, and he has a He’s a very outgoing person. Then this would be a way in which another person could recognize him according to his unique specific characteristics. This in order to recognize Jim, we need to apply the unique his unique characteristics. That is to say his specific characteristics.
That’s a necessity for that. So out of all these various people, we can look around and say, oh, that’s the person with the long mustache, red hair, etcetera. And therefore and then by according to specific characteristics, we can recognize Jim. So the same holds true in the case of, for example, the body. In order to be able to identify the body, we we we apply the the specific characteristics of it being a combination of elements and evolutes in order to bring it to to be able to recognize it.
Then thereby we can we can know what we mean by our own body because we can understand that which is a combination of elements and that is our body. We’re able to identify what we mean by body. So the body is a collection of its various parts legs, arms, head, etcetera. And that that that the place where that all of these parts are collected together is the body. So that which is a collection of elements and evolutes, we we give the we we apply the term body.
So in order to be able to meditate the four close establishments upon the body, it’s necessary that we recognize the body, and therefore, we must understand it in terms of its specific characteristics. And then proceeding in our examination in order to understand the nature of the body, whether it’s good, bad, clean, unclean, in the nature of pleasure, the nature of displeasure. Order to understand all of these qualities, we meditate the general characteristics with respect to the body. So we meditate the specific characteristics in order to be able to identify the observed object. And we meditate the general characteristic in order to understand the nature of the observed object, its qualities, its faults, its advantages, etcetera.
And the whole the same the same holds true for the remaining objects of observation. We we meditate the specific characteristics of feelings in order to be able to identify the entity of feelings. And we meditate the general characteristics of feelings in order to understand the nature of the feelings. And we go on to apply those two same characteristics to the mind and phenomena. So without knowing the specific characteristics of the object, that is to say, without recognizing the objects, there’s no way that we can carry on an examination as to its qualities, good, bad, etcetera.
So to hear, taking as the basis of examination his own body, that is collection of elements and evolutes, begins to apply the examination in terms of its general, the four general characteristics. He looks at the body and examines, well, is it impermanent or is it permanent? And he decides it’s impermanent. He looks at it, well, is it in the nature of satisfactoriness or dissatisfactoriness? It’s in the nature of dissatisfactoriness.
He looks at the body and is it empty of being the same entity, of a different entity than the self, or is it the same entity as the self? And he sees that it’s empty of being a different entity than the self. Then is the body the self, and he sees that the body is it’s a body of self sufficient self, and he sees that, you know, it lacks a self sufficient self. They want they Alright. Come on.
They they they target. One manner of meditating is in terms of these four general characteristics, are the characteristics which define a doctrine as the four Seals of a Buddhist Doctrine. The Four Seals of a Buddhist Doctrine. So one is to see the body as impermanent. One to examine the feelings as to whether they are in the nature of dissatisfactoriness or satisfactoriness.
And the mind, this can either be one of two ways, either in terms of it being empty and selfless, or only empty, in which case phenomena are to be seen as selfless. Or if you combine the emptiness, empty and selfless in terms of mind, phenomena are to be seen in terms of being in nirvana beyond sorrow. So in this manner of so in this manner of meditation, one would first examine one’s own body as to whether it was permanent or impermanent. We’re examining the body in terms as to whether it is impermanent or permanent, and we’re proceeding in this way of meditation. There are two types of meditation.
There is analytic meditation and stabilizing meditation. So in the initial part of meditation we analyze using a reasoning process and to see whether the body is impermanent or permanent. When we come to the end of our analysis, we come to a conclusion, then we cease examination, and we pointedly fixate upon the conclusion and this is stabilizing meditation. So whatever might we meditate on, there are these two types of meditation, analytic and stabilizing meditation. What is what do we mean by meditation?