Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The magician’s spell — a pebble and stick made to appear as horse and elephant — anchors Ven Jampa Gendun’s 40-minute commentary on the Autonomy Middle Way view of emptiness. Three figures in the analogy map onto three grades of understanding: the magician sees the illusion without grasping it as real, the entranced audience grasps completely, and the latecomer, unaffected by the spell, sees no horse at all. Gendun then explains how objects come into existence through a partnership of objective and subjective factors — not purely “out there,” not purely mind-made — noting a parallel with the participatory-observer model in contemporary physics. He closes on the “one or many” analysis: thinking of a whole (a car) makes the parts vanish from mind, and vice versa — a logical lever for dismantling belief in true existence.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 24 HoM 1993 09 22.mp3
UUID: b669f913-8da3-474a-a9a3-2b2acd61f1e9
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: The Heart and Mind of Awakening (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 1993-09-22
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 40.2 minutes
Words: ~3,977
If you are counting, stop counting. If you are noting, note. If you are not noting, begin to note. Emphasize acknowledging what the mind is involved in. Then allowing the mind to become focused upon any object that it naturally tends toward, but continually to note, continue to note what the mind is involved in.
From moment to moment, that gentle noting, acknowledging. Don’t lose your awareness. Stay awake. Then bring your awareness to the mind, the mental consciousness, and continue to note the thoughts, the images that arise, but try to focus upon the objects of the mental consciousness. Stay aware, keep noting.
And then stop noting, but try to maintain your awareness of the mental consciousness. Try to maintain your awareness. Stay awake. Then bring your mind back to the breath. And slowly becoming aware of your body in a gentle, relaxed manner.
You’re on good time becoming aware of your surroundings. So we are going to see if we can finish the third stage of the four stages in development of the the awakening mind. The third stage, the Autonomy Middle Way Stage. I guess, in looking at the essential understanding at this stage is the notion of true existence, the understanding that the way in which things achieve the status of existence, glasses, people, tables, is dependent upon, both, an objective and subjective factor, a combination of both of these in terms of something in terms of the intrinsic characteristics of the object, inherent characteristics appearing to an awareness. These two factors together bring the object into existence.
And last time, we’re gonna we’ll go over all of this, just some of the points that we’re going to that it’s useful to be aware of at the autonomy stage. Last time we talked about illustrating this, the example, the the analogy of a magician’s performance, where the magician cast a spell using a mantra which caused what is in fact a pebble and a stick to appear as a horse and elephant to anyone who came under the effects of that mantra. And we can there were three categories of people we can we can analyze. There is the magician herself. She hasn’t come under the influence of the mantra.
But so she sees a horse and an elephant on the stage. So there’s an appearance, but she understands that it’s not really a horse and elephant. Is there is an appearance, but it only appears that way under the influence of the mantra. Some internal effect of the mantra is causing what is in fact a pebble and a stick to appear as a horse and an elephant. So though there is the appearance, there is not the grasping at or conceiving of as real, a real horse and a real elephant.
On the part of the audience, they’ve they too have been affected by the mantra. So for them, there there is the appearance of a horse and elephant, but they don’t have an understanding that this is in fact, merely, brought about due to the effects of mantra. Therefore, they take what is in fact an illusion to be real. And they grasp at those appearance as being a real horse and a real elephant. And if they’re horse if they’re if they’re they’re horse fans or elephant fans, if it’s a beautiful horse, then it’s, well, I wish I had that horse.
I really like that horse. And they spin off all kinds of scenarios about how to get that horse and I gotta have that horse and that’s the most beautiful horse I’ve ever seen. And they develop attachment to that horse. If they don’t like maybe they don’t like elephants. They develop aversion to the elephant.
They want to get away from the elephant. So from the grasping as real and dependent upon its appearance in terms of its attractiveness or unattractiveness, attachment and aversion arise. And a third category of persons is someone who came late. And this person is not affected by the mantra. They weren’t there when this spell was cast.
And all these they went, oh, what are all these people staring at? All I see is a is a pebble and a twig. Not only is there no grasping that’s real, but there’s not there’s not even the appearance. So the the the the meaning of this analogy is that the magician is someone who has an understanding of emptiness, but still has ignorance within her mind. Even though we come we we develop in a we all have some everyone in this room has some understanding of emptiness.
But it’s At this point, it’s not powerful enough to overcome the force of our ignorance. Our ignorance is So our ignorance is still able to cause appearances to arise. Though but because of our understanding of emptiness, we may never we may not believe in those appearances as being true, as being real. In the case of the magician, though a horse and an elephant appears, he doesn’t believe them as real. So someone who has an understanding of emptiness but has not abandoned ignorance, things appear to truly exist.
They appear to exist independent of the mind. As if, you know, that things exist have no dependence upon the mind, that they truly exist. But they have do they appear that way? They don’t see to that appearance. They don’t grasp at that appearance as being true.
We’ll talk a little bit more about that as we go along. The audience so the audience is the naive realist. Those who know nothing about emptiness. What things appear to be truly existent, they conceive of them to be truly existent. They grasp at them to be truly existent.
And finally, the the the latecomer is someone who has direct realization of emptiness and someone who has abandoned completely ignorance and in the seeds of ignorance such that things no longer appear to them truly existent. Therefore, there is no question about them grasping to them as real, as true. Someone who has understood emptiness, the lack of ultimate existence, understands that phenomena do not exist exclusively from their own side, That an object’s mode of being depends upon being posited by non defective awareness to which it appears. So an object’s existence depends upon appearing to a non defective awareness. It doesn’t exist independent of that awareness.
A person who has understood emptiness is is like the magician who sees the appearance of a horse, but knows that the horse is not real. It is appearing through the power of that of the mind that has been affected by the mantra. The appearance of the horse is not merely a mental projection. It is a mode of subsistence of the pebble affected by the mantra and the staff. However, the illusory horse does not exist until the magician or the audience have looked at the pebble.
So the pebble is an objective factor coming from the side of the object. But in combination with the effects of the mantra, appears when the mind looks at it, there appears a horse and an elephant. Without the mind looking, if there is no awareness, there would not be a horse and an elephant. It requires the mind, in this case affected by mantra, to actually become aware of that that base of pebble on a stick for there to appear a horse and an elephant. Maybe, let’s see.
I’ll just bring up a few points here. For this thus for the Svatāntrika Svatāntrika is the Sanskrit word for the autonomy middle way school. For the Svatāntrika, two factors are essential. So The first is that the objective mode of subsistence of the object which exists from the object’s own side but does not exist independently. So there’s something coming from the side of the object.
In this example, there was there is something there is a pebble and a twig. That’s coming from the side of the object. That’s an objective mode of subsistence. It’s like when we like fire. The objective mode of fire is hot and burning.
That’s its intrinsic nature. But that in itself is not fire. It has to appear to a consciousness which then conceives on the basis of that fire in terms of appearing to an awareness. So there’s a factor coming from the side of the object, this hot and burning. There’s something coming that appears to awareness which conceives hot and burning, which conceives fire.
in dependence upon those two, fire comes into existence. Fire did not exist prior to that coming together of these subjective and objective factors. So that’s important in fact I think. The notion that there’s something We’re beginning to shift to the idea and we’re going to continue this when we come to the fourth stage that the mind is very much is not a passive observer looking onto a a real world out there. And this real world real world of tables and chairs and people kind of casts itself upon the mind, which is the notion of naive realism, has been a great part of the notion of modern of physics, of scientific thinking up till recently.
And that’s beginning to change. But the mind participates in the bringing forth of reality. The idea of a participatory universe, which is just becoming more and more current in contemporary physics. The observer being an integral part of what is observed. Here we’re at a midway.
You know, we’re trying to our mind is we have lots of beliefs. I talked about beliefs. And they act as a limiting force to our ability to grasp. You know, as long as for example, you know, I’ve used the analogy of coiled rope. You know, you’re probably fed up with coiled ropes by now.
Coiled ropes and snakes. As long as there is a strong belief in the existence of a snake at that place, this will act to obstruct one seeing the rope. You know? It’s not as if, you know, no one somebody can tell, but there’s a rope there, but there’s a rope there, but there’s a rope there. But you’ll still see snake.
It’s not and that that conception of it’s not it’s not just a fact that one’s going to replace the conception of snake with conception of rope. But it’s more than that. The conception of rope is actually the conception of snake conception of snake is actually an obstruction to conceiving of that object as rope. You know, it’s something more than that. Ignorance is something more than a veil.
It is actually I mean, it is a veil, but it actually acts to prevent us from seeing what is. It it actually it distorts. It actually inhibits. So it’s not just like like taking away, you know, like there’s something there’s a cloth covering the table. We just whip it away and you see what is.
But but there there is a resistance to that moving of that of that taking away of the cloth. It’s just not in a we then there is a belief in in the snake, which acts, which inhibits the ability to see rope. So we have to weaken that ability, that that belief in snake. And we can do this in progressive stages. And here at this stage, we’re beginning to come we have a belief that things exist independently of the mind.
They’re out there. The basis for this belief is because that’s the way they appear to us. It’s quite understandable. So now we’re just hearing about these ideas. But in order to see that they don’t exist independently, we have to overcome the obstacle to see that scene, which is our beliefs and that they exist independently.
And we we have to we’re going to do this in progressive stages. Here, we’re at a at a midway stage. We’re saying that they do not exist independently, but there is something coming from the side of the object. When we go on to the fourth stage, the Consequentialist Middle Way school, then we’re going to get into a rather radical position, which is in that we’re going to say that nothing is coming from the side of the object, that everything is coming from the side of the subject. So here we’re a midway point.
It is the mind is involved in the bringing forth of objects, but it is like in a partnership. And then at the fourth stage, when I say the mind takes over, the mind is the determinant of reality. So we’re involved in an evolution, a breaking down of our rigid beliefs and misconceptions, working through a process. At this stage, the middle way school does not accept true existence. I think this is an important point.
What we mean, we have to get we have to gain some conception about the way things appear to us. I mean, that may sound odd. But here, we’re not talking about when when I see the table, that there’s there’s a there’s a a red flat, you know, of such and such a height, such and such a width. But by appearance, we mean the way the table appears to exist, the way that it exists. What is the ultimate nature of that table?
Is the table itself its own ultimate nature? Is it is if I if I search for the way is the table self established? We have to we have to develop some mental picture, some image in our mind of what we mean by true existence. The way the table exists. This is We have to This is called the object of negation.
This is what we’re It is like like seeing the rope, seeing the snake. It is we have to be able to identify what it is that we’re seeing in terms of its way of existing. Now we’ve we’ve never looked at objects in this way, in kind of term, so it sounds very strange. For example, overcome our belief in the true existence of an object by coming to believe in its non true existence. That sounds kind of simple minded, that’s the way it works.
Of the same object. The two beliefs are incompatible. If we can come to an understanding that this table does not truly exist, we will overcome our belief that it truly exists. If we can come to an understanding that it does not truly exist, we will overcome our belief that it truly exists. You know, through through the outward appearance, for example, you see somebody and they’re red in the face and they have a scowl, a scowl.
You see scowl. There. Oh, my goodness. Hang in there with me for a couple more minutes here. Somebody’s very angry. They got red in their face, they have a scowl on their face. And you might believe that this person is angry at you on the basis of their appearance. But through using your reasoning, you might think to yourself that we can form some kind of rational belief that contradicts our initial impression. You know, we may think, for example, that that this person is sick. Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah. They they said they had you know, they said they weren’t feeling well. And I they’re they’re they’re they’re one of my best friends, and I haven’t done anything wrong lately. I don’t think and I can’t you know, I think and and they’re being sick, that would account for that appearance. Though your initial impression might be that they’re angry at you, rational belief, you can come to a belief based upon your rational belief which doesn’t accede to that belief, that appearance as being angry.
Here we’re talking about some kind of the use of reason analysis and coming to an understanding that our initial interpretation of that appearance was not correct. This in itself, it still may not be strong enough for us to overcome our belief that they’re angry at us. Maybe we have some doubt. Well, maybe maybe they are angry at me. I don’t know why but so we can vacillate.
We can come to some kind of qualm or some kind of doubt. And finally, we we we go up to them and we say, are you angry at me? And they explain, no, no, no, no, On the contrary, you know, I I’m not feeling very well and I I I really like to have you around. It really makes me feel comfortable. It, and that direct experience of their non dislike for us, their non anger at us, completely eliminates the belief which we still harbored that they were angry at us.
On the other hand, if you continually to reinforce your initial belief of their anger at you using fallacious reasoning, wrong reasoning. Even when the person tried to convey to you their non anger, you still strongly hold a preconception that prevents you from believing of what they’re telling you and feeling the truth of what they’re saying. So in overcoming mistaken beliefs, reason analysis facilitates a direct experience. Of the actual situation. I think I’m just going to go into some reasoning.
So I was we can this reason analysis assists thinking using syllogism, using logic can help us to come to a direct experience. And in some some areas, even within Buddhism, is dismissed that it’s part of the problem. But it is we make use of it every day of our life, our ability to reason, to overcome misconceptions, to overcome wrong beliefs about little things, about great things. So it has its proper place: reason analysis. And so we’re going to make use of a reason analysis to help us overcome our belief in true existence.
To be truly existent and I’m just going to talk a few more minutes, Okay? It’d be good to to finish because we were gonna have a have a break coming up. It’d be good to finish the Autonomy tonight so you can gain all the realizations during the break. To be truly existent means that the way an object appears is the way that it actually exists. Its mode of appearance is established as its mode of being.
I know this sounds meaningless maybe, but anyway we’ll try to work with it and what it means. These are new things I can understand the words are difficult. The concepts are even more difficult. If someone speaks or acts in a way which is not a true expression of what they really believe or what their actual thinking is, who they actually are. If you know, we we call them we call them deceitful or false or phony.
And they they act one way and they think another way. They’re not being honest. They’re not being real. They’re not being true. So objects appear to us in one particular way.
They appear to us to exist completely independent of the mind, this glass. Here, at this stage, at the autonomy stage, true existence does not appear to the physical sense consciousnesses. It only appears to the mental consciousness when we think about things. When I think about this table, I think about my bed at home, when I think about my friend. That friend, that bed at home, that table, which appears to me, appears to truly exist.
Here at the Autonomy Middle Way Stage, true existence does not appear to the eye consciousness, for example, or to the ear consciousness, just to the mental consciousness. It appears to truly exist. Now what does it mean to truly exist? To be true, to be real, to be honest means that the way things appear, the way they really are, are in agreement, they accord with one another.
That’s what we generally mean by true. So the things appear, when I think about things, they appear not to have anything to do with my mind. That they’re not posited by the force of appearing to my awareness. That they exist independent of my mind. That’s the way they appear.
But in fact, they exist in dependence upon my mind. Their actual nature is that they depend upon that they are posited by appearing to my mind. If they don’t appear to my mind, they don’t exist. But that’s not the way they appear. So there’s a difference between the way things appear and the way they exist.
Therefore, they they are not true. They do not truly exist. And the way that we’re going to approach this when the mind thinks about, when the mind thinks about various objects, when we think about a person, when we think about a table, when we think about friend, the object appears to be partless. I don’t know if you can, know, my my car out on the street. I think car.
It just there there’s there’s a car. It’s it’s it’s richness of you know, there’s it doesn’t you know, there’s a scrape along the scrape on both sides, actually. You know, all the the chrome that’s missing, all those various parts don’t appear to my mind. Just car. There’s my car.
A a partless car appears to my mind, which is my car. It’s not mine actually either. I’m gonna think of it. I have to give it back this week. But there appears the object which appears appears to be partless, a partless whole.
At that moment, the parts of the object do not appear to my mind, not to my eye consciousness or and I’m talking about to my mental consciousness. When I think about my car, the whole a car as a as a solid unity, a unitary, homogenous, undifferentiated kind of mass thing appears to me. It’s all its various parts. Anyway, it’s dense and all that. It’s rust.
Don’t appear to my mind. All its various its wheels, body, its motor, all those things don’t appear to my mental consciousness. On the other hand, when I think about the parts, the car does not appear the hole does not appear to my mind when I think about the dent. The hole doesn’t appear to my to my mind at that point. We cannot conceive, think about the whole and the parts simultaneously.
If we think about the whole, we cannot think about the parts. When we think about the parts, we cannot think about the whole. It is not that the whole and the parts are two different things. In fact, they are one entity. But when we think about them, they appear as two different entities.
Another way of saying this is that we cannot designate the whole and the parts simultaneously. We cannot name. We cannot project, think about, conceive of the whole and the parts simultaneously. I cannot think of a page of a book and the whole of the book simultaneously. When we begin to analyze an appearing object an object when an object appears to us, a whole, a partless whole, once we begin to analyze that, the whole no longer has been no longer will appear to our mind.
But when the appearing object is not analyzed, it is able to be maintained. It is a partless unit. Are you still with me here? So I’m I’m going to, see there there’s there’s a method of analysis that that that is used at the autonomy middle way stage in order to overcome the conception of true existence. It’s called the it’s called the lack of being one or many.
Other words for one or one and many are are same and different. Singular and multiplicity, singularity and multiplicity. One