Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Khensur Rinpoche opens this 96-minute commentary on Nāgārjuna’s Precious Garland with the verse “Due to having many parts, one does not exist,” building a sustained argument for emptiness through three levels of dependent arising. Starting with a bell, he shows that all phenomena have parts — spatial parts for physical objects, momentary parts for the mind, directional parts for space. He then moves to the highest Madhyamaka view: all things arise in dependence on names and concepts, illustrated through a child being named Tashi and a student in the room named Robin. The table on the floor anchors the full emptiness argument before Rinpoche closes with the image of wisdom as a bushfire blazing through dry Australian countryside. A Q&A addresses what remains of the I after death, whether emptiness is itself a concept, and the magician analogy for practitioners who have realized emptiness but not yet abandoned the seeds of grasping.
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File: 07 PG 1991 03 09.mp3
UUID: 68c82110-0568-4835-bd5f-b208ca4db45a
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Precious Garland 1990-1991 (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1991-03-09
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 96.0 minutes
Words: ~5,366
Begin by adjusting our motivation, cultivating the awakening heart. Begin with rejoicing in the wonderful opportunity which the human life presents us as a means by which to practice the Dharma. Though we have attained this precious human life, if we do not make use of it, it will simply be wasted. It be of no benefit to us. What use are we to make of our human life?
We are all exactly the same in wanting to be happy and not wanting to suffer. And so the greatest use that we can make of our life is the elimination of suffering and the bringing of a stable peace. And this state of happiness completely divorced of any suffering is not something which can be attained through external means, but only through the internal means of the practice of Dharma. In the course of our practice of Dharma, we want to have as much effective, powerful practice as possible. And this arises through the healthy most attitude of the awakening heart as the impetus behind our practice.
And how are we to reflect upon the development of the awakening heart? Begin by by with a thought which holds other more precious, more dear than oneself, and wishes to move them from out of their suffering and to establish them in complete happiness. And if I am to lead others to this state of complete happiness, completely divorced of any suffering, then I myself must eliminate all my various faults and bring to consummation all my excellent qualities. And in order to achieve that end, then I have to create the causes to achieve this, and therefore I must practice. With the attitude which wishes to free all sentient beings from their suffering and to establish them in a happiness completely divorced of all suffering, then I must carry out the various practices of the great vehicle.
In order to carry out those practices, in order to implement them, I must listen and understand these various practices. Therefore, for the next three minutes, seek to cultivate such a motivation for listening to the present teaching. So we’re going to begin our teaching today on Precious Garland, Nāgārjuna’s Precious Garland with the verse. Due to having many parts, one does not exist. There is not anything which is without parts.
Further, without one, many does not exist. And without existence, there is no nonexistence. So let’s begin with an example of parts. We take as the basis of our illustration the bell. The bell has many parts.
It has the inside, outside. It has top and bottom. It has many different parts. And this quality extends to all physical matter whatsoever. All things have parts.
They have, for example, the top, the bottom, the sides. They have the directional parts, east, north, south, west. All of these parts are different. But even we can extend this quality of possessing parts to non physical things. For example, the mind.
The mind is not physical, consciousness. And it does not have directional parts, such as east, south, etc. But it does still have parts. It has momentary parts. For example, it has the first moment of mind, the second moment of mind.
It has the earlier part and the latter part of a continuum of mind. So even the mind has momentary parts. For example, with respect to today’s mind, there is the mind of this morning, there is the mind of this afternoon, and there is the mind of this evening. The continuum of mind over this period is changed from moment to moment. There is the former moments of mind and later moments of mind.
During the course of these twenty four hours, there is a continuum of different parts of the mind. So likewise, the mind is made up of a continuum of parts of mind, momentary parts. But even those things which are neither form nor mind still have parts. For example, a year or a month. A year or a month are neither form or physical nor are they mind, consciousness.
But for example, a year has parts of twelve months. A month has parts because is made up of thirty days. A week has parts because it is made up of seven days. So even these non physical, non mental things have parts. Therefore, we can say that all things, and by things I mean those phenomena which arise from causes, products, that they all haven’t risen from causes.
They all have momentary disintegration. They all have parts. They rise and they disintegrate. So all things have parts, but we can go further and say that additionally all non things have parts. By non things, it is meant phenomena which are not results, which do not arise from cause and condition.
That is to say, unconditioned phenomena. For example, space. Space is an unconditioned phenomena, but still it has parts. It has directional parts. For example, east, north, south, and west.
It has the space above, the space below. So even these non things have parts. All phenomena whatsoever must either be one or many. Other synonyms I could use for translation are same. For one, same, identical.
And for many, different or distinct. So all phenomena whatsoever are included in either of the categories of being one or many. By one, one is identical or it is the same, it is one. Anything above that, for example two, three, etc, are necessarily many. So everything is either one or many.
All phenomena whatsoever are included in one of these two categories. So even that which is single or one possesses parts. Many possesses parts. Therefore, whatsoever exists possesses parts. There is nothing which is partless.
Quoting from a verse from Fundamental Wisdom, in which it said that because all phenomena rely upon their parts for their existence, all phenomena are dependent arising. That is to say, all phenomena are established in dependence upon their parts. Therefore, all phenomena must be dependent arising since they arise dependent upon their parts. So all phenomena whatsoever arise in dependence upon their parts, in reliance upon their parts. The terms dependent arising and dependently related have the same sense.
The latter portion of that verse, Fundamental Wisdom, goes on to say that because all phenomena are dependent arisings, then all phenomena are empty of inherent existence. Because phenomena are dependent arisings, they are empty of inherent existence. That means they are not established inherently. These two ways of being are mutually incompatible or contradictory ways of existing. Things are dependent on arising because they rely upon something other than themselves for their existence.
They are dependent upon something other than themselves for them to exist. Therefore, they cannot be inherently existing because inherent existent means that the object does not depend upon something other than itself. That the object inheres within itself without relying upon anything other than itself. And these two ways of being are mutually incompatible. So we give a simple analogy, in the case of an old person who is feeble.
This feeble old person, in order to get up, has to rely upon someone else to help them up. They cannot get up under their own power. If they were well, then they could get up under their own power, but they are not. Therefore they have to rely upon another person for them to get up. They depend upon someone else to get up.
So this infirm person is not able to rise under his own power. That in order to rise up, he has to rely upon the power of someone else. Likewise, all phenomena are established through the power of other phenomena than themselves. They’re not self powered. They cannot establish themselves.
So all phenomena arise in reliance upon something other than themselves. That is to say, they are not self-powered, independent. Another word for self powered is independent. They do not exist independently. They exist dependently.
So the non independent existence is emptiness. The lack of independent existence is the emptiness of independent existence. According to verse by Je Tsongkhapa, in which he says that all the undesired, the suffering and the fears and the trouble that we as worldly beings experience arise in dependence upon ignorance. The Buddha taught that the method whereby to be rid of ignorance is the cultivation of the understanding of dependent arising. So in your meditation on emptiness, it’s imperative that we understand the dependent arising.
In how we come to an understanding of dependent arisings, there are various degrees of subtlety with respect to the presentation of dependent arisings. For example, with respect to the lower tenet systems, the lower philosophic systems, They begin with a rough explanation of dependent arising in which they interpret dependent arising as to mean arising in dependence upon causes and conditions. Arising in dependence upon causes and conditions is for them what they mean by dependent arising. But if we were to go a little bit deeper into the meaning dependent arising, a more subtle presentation of the meaning would be as was just mentioned, that phenomena are dependent arising because they arise in dependence upon their parts. In the case of physical phenomena, this is their very spatial parts.
In the case of consciousness, in dependence upon their momentary parts. And in the case of unconditioned phenomena, their directional parts. So in this case, what is meant by dependent arising is arising in dependence upon parts. The most subtle explanation of the meaning of dependent arising is that set forth by the Consequentialist Middle Way school. They not only would include these former presentations of the meaning of dependent arising, but they go on additionally to have the most subtle meaning with respect to what the meaning of dependent arising.
This is to say that all phenomena whatsoever arise in dependence upon terms and concepts. The word term can also more literally be translated as name. For example, we say the name flower, table. And concepts are the thought which thinks flower, which thinks table, which thinks book, that all phenomena whatsoever are established merely in dependence upon these names or terms and these concepts. If we were to give an example of what we mean by this, initially upon birth, a child has no name.
It might be referred to as a boy or a girl. This is the general terms which are given to the sexes of the child in that particular language group. They call it a boy or they call it a girl, but it has no name proper. So I think the moment of birth, the child has no particular name. But if we were within the Tibetan culture, we might give that child the name of, for example, Tashi or Losang or Thubten or Jampa.
And for example, let’s say they think, well, what should we call it? And they go, oh let’s call it Tashi. So they give it the name Tashi. And they think, this is Tashi. On point of giving the name Tashi, the thought arises in the mind, this is Tashi.
Other people come, they say, who’s that? Oh, that’s Tashi. Ah, that’s Tashi. On, whenever they see this person, ah, that’s Tashi. Tashi is established in dependence upon being given that name.
It comes into existence in dependence upon being given that name. Tashi comes into existence on being given that name. If this child was not given that name, Tashi would not exist. So when there’s one student in his class named Robin. When Robin was first born, there was an infant without a name.
So maybe her father or mother or some relative gave it a name. Let’s call the child Robin. So, in dependence upon being given that name, Robin came into existence. And then eventually, whenever anyone met her, said, Oh, that’s Robin. And when they saw this person coming, here comes Robin.
And so Robin came into existence and it depends upon being given that name. So, Robin Robin came into existence and dependence upon a name and concepts, terms and concepts. Her existence, Robin depends, the existence of Robin depends upon terms and concepts. That Robin does not exist independently of terms and concepts. If Robin existed independently of terms, names, and concepts, then immediately upon her birth, they would say, Ah, Robin’s just been born.
But she doesn’t exist that way. She doesn’t exist independent of terms and concepts. We are all exactly the same way, exist in the same way. Initially upon our birth, parents or someone gave us a name. Dependence upon that name, we as that person came into existence.
For example, in the case of Jampa, upon birth, there was an infant and someone gave this infant that named Jampa and in dependence upon that, Jampa came into existence. Jampa did not exist independently of having been given that name. If Jampa had existed independently of being named, then immediately upon birth, somebody would say, Here comes Jampa, without even being given a name. But that’s not the fact. We all can understand in this way that who we are arises in dependence upon terms or names and concepts.
So all phenomena come into existence in exactly the same way. We take another example of that of the eyeglasses. Initially upon when someone first made eyeglasses, it had no name. Therefore, eyeglasses simply didn’t exist. Someone said, let’s call these eyeglasses.
Then eyeglasses came into existence. And then after that, someone first initially calling these objects eyeglasses, it became known that these are eyeglasses. When they saw them, people thought, Oh, there’s a pair of eyeglasses. Or the same is the case of a flower. Before it was given that name, flowers didn’t exist.
Before it was designated as flower, flowers didn’t exist. Upon being designated as flower, then when people saw these objects, the thought flower arose in their mind and they called them flowers. This holds true for all objects whatsoever, tables, all the various objects in this room, that none of them exist independently of the process of being designated by means of terms and concepts. When we see a table, the table appears to us to exist as if it were not dependent upon being designated as a table. That’s the way it appears to us.
The table appears to us to exist objectively from its own side independent of names, terms, and concepts. That’s the way it appears to us. And we grasp to that appearance as to the way the object actually exists. That awareness which grasps at the object to exist the way it appears is the ignorance grasping at true existence. The reasoning which is being presented here is, I live dependent arising.
They’re making use of the reason of having parts in order to establish emptiness. When I look at the table, the table appears to exist independent of being imputed by terms and concepts. That is to say that the table exists from its own side independent of terms and concepts. The way that we refute such a way of existing is by making use of the reason why does it not exist the way it appears because it has parts. The awareness which holds that it exists the way it appears is a mistaken awareness.
It appears to exist independently, but it is not because it has parts. So this way of approaching and understanding emptiness is more readily accessible for us. But we can begin to get a sense of what emptiness might mean in terms of dependent arising. Using the table as an example, we can understand that it has parts. It has north part, south part, east and west parts.
It has the part above and the part below. Also, arises in dependence upon causes and conditions. And also, as we just mentioned, it arises in dependence upon being given a name, in dependence upon concepts. We can gain a rough estimation of what dependent arising is from this, that the table is established upon all of these various parts. We can begin to understand what an emptiness of independent existence would mean by understanding, by making use the reason having parts.
For example, taking the table as the basis of illustration, the table has parts. It is a whole. But it appears that it exists independently. It exists independent of its parts. It exists independent of name and concepts.
That it exists from its own side. It appears to exist independent of its parts. Does in fact it exists in dependence upon its own by its own power. It does not because it has parts. If something has parts, then to have parts and to be not reliant are contradictory.
The object, the table relies on its parts for existence. Therefore, the table does not exist not reliably on its parts. To rely and not to rely are mutually contradictory. The table appears to us to exist not to rely upon anything else, to exist independently. But in fact, using reasoning that it has parts, then we can understand that it must rely, its existence relies upon its parts.
And therefore, the way it appears is not the way it exists. The table exists relying upon names and concepts, terms and concepts. The table appears, that’s the way it exists, But it appears to exist from its own side. Now independently, it appears to exist independently. If the table existed the way it appeared, then the table would have to have no parts.
But we know it has parts. The table appears to us to exist independently. That is to say, not rely on parts. That is to say, it appears to exist partless, as a partless whole. But we know it’s not partless.
Therefore, we know that it’s not independently existing. We know that it relies upon terms and concepts for its existence. The table appears not to depend upon names, terms, and concepts. That’s the way we think of the table. But this is a false assumption.
This appearance is false. It’s very much like the appearance of a reflection of a face in a mirror. There appears a face, but that face, that appearance is not really a face. It is a reflection of a face. So the reflection of a face is a false face.
It’s not really a face, though it appears to be. The way it exists and the way it appears are different. Likewise, the table appears not to rely upon causes and conditions. It appears not to rely upon being designated by means of terms and names. It appears not to rely upon parts.
But this appearance is false. This awareness which holds that this is the way it exists is a distorted awareness. What we are saying is that things don’t always exist the way they appear. Things do exist one way and we generally grasp to their appearance as being true. This is the way in fact it must exist.
This is the way it appears and this is the way it must exist. But can’t we say that there are occasions when we have been mistaken as to the actual way something exists with respect to how it appears? That something appears differently than the way it appears? So, we are susceptible to many mistakes in this fashion. We cannot conclude decisively, I’m not mistaken about this appearance.
That’s the way it really exists. To hold that would be simply incorrect. Just like the table, we can apply this to one’s own self, the I. Now, in general, the I exists, the self exists. It nominally exists, but the I appears to us to exist independently.
The I appears to us to exist as if it didn’t depend upon anything else, that it didn’t rely upon anything else, that existed under its own power independently. The awareness which grasped at this new way of existing is the ignorance grasping at true existence. Likewise, though the I appears to exist in this way, to exist as if it didn’t depend upon terms and concepts. It does not. Why?
Because it has parts. Initially the yogi begins his meditation on selflessness by seeking to understand the emptiness of the I, the self. Subsequent to that she moves to the non inherent existence of the five aggregates. That is, for example, the aggregate of forms of the body, feelings, perceptions, mental constructs, and consciousnesses, that these do not exist, these do not inherently exist because they are dependent arisings. Initially contemplating selflessness in terms of the I, one realizes emptiness.
Through this, simply turning the mind to another object, one almost immediately can realize the emptiness of that object. according to your verse in which it says that once emptiness has been realized in terms of one thing, then merely turning the mind and applying the reason to other phenomena without any difficulty, without any effort, the emptiness of that phenomena will be realized. In this way we can understand the emptiness of all phenomena. And we developed a powerful wisdom realizing emptiness. So once this powerful wisdom realizing emptiness has been developed, is just as if it is like a blazing bushfire raging through the countryside of this dry Australia.
It completely annihilates the grasping at true existence in its path along with its seeds. The the wisdom realizing emptiness is analogous to this raging fire. Grasping of true existence, the various afflictive emotions such as anger, attachment, etc, are like the dry tinder of the grasses and trees. Quoting from a verse from Entering Into the Middle Way, likens the wisdom realizing emptiness to firewood, the blazing firewood, by means of which all the various faults are burnt away, such as the afflictive emotions and obstructions to knowledge. By means of the wisdom realizing emptiness, the root of all of our sufferings is eliminated and one achieves the bliss of liberation.
If this wisdom realizing emptiness is accompanied with the awakening heart and compassion, by means of this assisting force of awakening heart and compassion, one will thereby achieve Buddhahood. If this wisdom realizing emptiness is not assisted by the awakening heart and compassion, then there’s no way to achieve Buddhahood. But we can achieve by that means liberation from cyclic existence. So whether we attain Buddhahood or liberation from cyclic existence, they both necessarily have as their root the wisdom realizing emptiness. Without the wisdom realizing emptiness, then there’s no liberation from cyclic existence nor is there Buddhahood.
So whether we are seeking liberation or Buddhahood, the main factor which is necessary to develop is the wisdom realizing emptiness. In order to achieve this then, we have to generate the understanding of emptiness. And this is done through cultivation, through meditation. In our meditation we must reflect on these various types of reasoning set forth. Without reflecting upon these various types of reasoning, there will arise no realization of emptiness.
It’s just like if we were simply to think, Oh, this is emptiness, and simply sit there with a thought in our mind, This is dependent arising. This is emptiness. Out of this will not arise a realization of emptiness. It’s just like sitting there and thinking, I am eating. Just that thought will not fill your stomach.
You actually have to eat. And likewise, with cultivating an understanding of emptiness, you must reflect upon reasoning. You can’t just think this is emptiness. If we proceed by studying various books, setting out the meaning of emptiness, we listen to teachings given by qualified teachers who set forth the meaning of emptiness. If we go on and cultivate in our meditation what we have heard, what we have read, that we also combine it with purifying various obstacles and we’re developing a great deal of personal power, then before not too long we will realize emptiness.
So today we have presented the means of understanding emptiness in terms of the reason having parts. That we say things do not truly exist because they have parts. For example, the table or the I. I do not truly exist because I have parts. So trying to cultivate what is being meant here.
This is, you know, we should reflect upon this. And this, Miriam’s process of reflecting is like planting a seed. We will implant and make impressions of predispositions for its eventual understanding within our mind. We all know quite easily that without having planted a seed, no plants are going to arise. In order for a plant to grow, first we must have planted a seed.
And this reflection upon the meaning of emptiness is like the planting of the seed. Out of this will grow the plant of the wisdom realizing emptiness. But first we have to plant the seed in the field. We actually have to consider these reasonings so that eventually we will the crop will grow. So the field of the worldly farmer is his field.
The field of the dharma practitioner is where he plants the seed is his own mind. So if you have some questions, then we’ll spend a few minutes on questions. If you don’t have questions, then we’ll spend a few minutes on meditating on emptiness. Yes? We die, when our body dies, and then mind still exists before emptiness, are we gaining nothing else?
I said she would do so. Tony. Tony. Tony. Negative.
So what do you mean by abiding in emptiness? What do you mean by that? He’s identified as being dependent upon us being part of the dependent and when our thought will exist, the way we exist when our body dies is that So the I has parts, as was mentioned. Upon death, one of those parts becomes non existent. That is to say, the aggregate of forms.
The body becomes non existent. But there are five aggregates. There is the aggregate of feelings, perceptions, mental constructs, and consciousnesses. So there still remain four parts even though the part of the body has become non existent. That’s a good question.
So there’s nothing which doesn’t have parts. If we begin with a bell, we can divide it first into gross parts such as the various directions, south, north, east, west, then we can divide those up into various directional parts. We can go on and we will come down to atoms. The bell is composed of atoms. Those atoms in turn have directional parts.
There’s the north and east of the atom, the north of the atom, south and east of those have directional parts. So there is nothing which does not have part. Appear not being the way things appear. That’s pretty clear. Does it hit to a point though where emptiness is not emptiness per se, but it’s the refutation of concepts?
Because for instance, the the the baby the baby Tashi that’s born isn’t Tashi, but is Rinpoche suggesting that one not feed it because it doesn’t exist? Do you see what I mean? How far do you go? There’s no there’s no there’s no no baby Tashi. There is no baby Tashi, but there is this There’s nothing to be fair.
There’s a child. He said there was a child. He said there’s an infant, a boy or a girl. So it gets to the question of absolute existence. So that there is an absolute existence of this creature.
So emptiness doesn’t go beyond that point. What point? The point of that one. The point of recognizing, of of refuting, of of recognizing that all things are dependent arising because they’re dependent upon the concepts that that we construct them from. Do we do we go to a point where we say, not only that flower doesn’t exist as flower, but that flower doesn’t exist atomically?
There is no structure there. So if you were to put that into a question, what would you say? If I put that into a question, I would say, is emptiness is the concept of emptiness on which we are to be meditating? Why do say concept of emptiness? Why don’t you just say emptiness?
Because for me it’s still a concept. Yeah, but okay. I mean, if we simplify as much as possible, then it’s clear. Is emptiness, is the emptiness on which one is to meditate the recognition and the refutation of the concepts and constructs by which we create the world, by which we designate the world? Or is it beyond fashion?
Should we not be passionate? A big a bonja, tony day. Well, I’ll just say this and then you can develop your question more. Maybe we can just go piece by piece. All phenomena are nominally existent.
Emptiness is also nominally existent. Which is why I was calling it a concept of emptiness. So that it is correct to call it a concept of emptiness. Because emptiness of of itself doesn’t exist. Emptiness is also empty.
It’s not truly existent. It only nominally exists. If the afflictive emotions arise as a result of our misconception that things exist in dependence upon your own side, let me try and give us an example, perhaps an example of sort of before and after, I mean, you know like how we might see something that creates the effect of emotion because we haven’t realised emptiness. But then how we might sort of, how it might appear differently or in what form it might appear. How an object might appear.
It is, or it is a person or it’s happening. I think particularly with people and anger, how we might deal For someone who has realized emptiness, but who has not as yet abandoned the seed of grasping true existence, they have a realization of emptiness, but they haven’t abandoned the seed of grasping true existence, then phenomena would appear very much as they do to a magician. For example, through conjuring, a magician is able to bring about the illusion, the illusory appearance of horses and elephants. There arises the appearance of horses and elephants. The horse and elephant appears, but the magician knows that it’s not really a horse, it’s not really an elephant, it’s merely the appearance of a horse and elephant.
He does not believe that it is a real horse and elephant, though it appears to be. Likewise, for someone who has realized emptiness, that is to say who has abandoned the grasping of true existence, but not as of yet the seed grasping true existence. True existence phenomena appear, true existence appears, but he does not believe that the object exists the way it appears. There is what is called the combination of appearance and emptiness. The objects appear, but this appearance is combined with the understanding that this object is empty of the way or mode of appearance.
For someone who has completely abandoned even the seeds of grasping a true existence, there’s not even the appearance of true existence. It’s an analogy. He said it was emptiness is empty of inherent existence. Emptiness does not truly exist. Yes?
If you see the the the reality of a phenomena, can you see all the what do you mean by karmic what do you mean by karmic and the neurogenesis in the cold. Merely realizing emptiness of that phenomena, it may be one may realize the various causes which have brought that phenomena into existence or one may not realize it. It’s possible either of these two cases could be the case. So it would depend upon making a proceeding with an analysis of the various causes of that phenomena. And then if you proceed in analysis, investigating, you could follow through and understand the various causes which brought this phenomenon to existence.
But just realizing emptiness doesn’t mean that one necessarily proceeds with any type of analysis. One simply knows the nature that this object is empty and doesn’t necessarily make any type of analysis as to what its causes are. So both possible cases.