sixth patriarch's sutra january 18 lecture

7/30/2019 Sixth Patriarch's Sutra January 18 lecture

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The Sixth Patriarchs Sutra7:30pm Pacific timeJanuary 18, 2013 lecture

as outlined by a Buddhist monkat 1777 Murchison Drive, Burlingame, California 94010, open to public

(phone 650-6925912)(Listen live or recorded audio explanations at

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. .

Q&A Disengage sense objects = empty peopleand empty phenomena

Chapter 6 Repentance and reform the 3 refugesof our own nature

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Verse for opening a sutra

Na Mwo Fundamental Teacher Shakyamuni Buddha (3x)

Homage to the Dharma Jewel Platform Sutra (3x)

The unsurpassed, deep, profound, subtle, wonderful Dharma, In a hundred thousand million eons, is difficult to encounter,

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,hearing,

I vow to fathom the Thus Come Ones true and actual meaning.

Exhortation to uphold the Dharma: 2/486

All Buddhas Doubly Perfect Honored Ones know the Dharmas areeternally without a nature. The Buddha seed arises from conditions;thus they speak of the One Vehicle. This Dharma abides in theDharmas position dwelling forever in worldly marks. Havingunderstood this in the Bodhimanda,the Guiding Master teaches it

expediently. (The Wonderful Dharma Lotus Flower Sutra)


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Q&A

Question: Why is it recommended that we make new vows orrenew vows on the day of enlightenment of Buddha

Shakyamuni which is on the 8th day of the 12th lunar month?

Answer:

Because on that day, the Buddha began speaking the Dharma;the first Sutra spoken was the The Great Means ExpansiveBuddha Flower Adornment Sutra over 21 days

and because we have benefited from the Buddhas Dharma,

we want to repay our gratitude by making vows to cultivate on

that day. 3


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Q&A

Question: Why is disengaging from sense objects by the method ofthe organ of the ear the same as the prajna principle to empty

people and empty dharmas?

Answer:

Why do we want to disengage from sense objects?

Because we want to empty the objects of awareness from ourmind because our present awareness is distorted .

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Q&A

I (Bodhisattva Maitreya) focused on a practice of contemplatingthat everything in the ten directions exists only in

consciousness. My mind gained perfect understanding andI understood the true nature of reality.

Bodhisttva Guanyin: My awareness and the objects of my

awareness were emptied, and when that process ofemptying my awareness was wholly complete

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Q&A

then even that emptying and what had been emptiedvanished.

Coming into being and ceasing to be themselves ceased tobe. Then the ultimate stillness was revealed.

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Q&A

The purpose of disengaging sense objects are to empty myawareness of objects because the objects are like the second

moon; our original understanding is like the moon, the secondmoon comes about because we ignorantly press our eyeball

and now we see two moons.

When a person with the eye disease sees the illusory

circles of colored light around the lamp, the circles seemto him to be external objects, but in fact what the personsees is a consequence of the disease. The disease placesa distorting strain on his visual awareness; it is not the

colored light that places the strain

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Q&A

all that you can see now the mountains, the rivers, themany lands, and the various forms of life are the resultof a disease that has existed in your visual awarenesssince time without be innin

Both the individual karma and the shared karma havecome into being because of distortions in awareness thathave existed since time without beginning.

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Q&A

Our present awareness is not the awareness that is aware ofits defect.

To restate: your visual awareness of me now, and ofourself and of the ten classes of bein s that can be seen

in the world, is a defective awareness. It is not theawareness that is aware of the defect.

The true nature of the essence of visual awareness is notdefective, and therefore it is not what is ordinarily referredto as visual awareness.(visual awareness is being distortedby karma.) 9


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Q&A

Why do we want to empty people and empty dharmas?

,

that what understands emptiness and the emptiness thatis understood are empty as well

To return the cognitive faculty to purity so that allphenomena are understood to be empty: that is the best

method. 10


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Q&A

The purpose of disengaging sense objects are to empty my

awareness of objects and my ordinary awareness;

another way of saying empty people and empty dharmasbecause sense objects are people and dharmas.

Both disengaging sense objects or to say, empty people and

empty dharmas arrive at the original true mind

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Q&A

Nevertheless all being with outflows and all the lands in

the ten directions, are fundamentally the enlightened,wondrous, luminous mind that understands and has nooutflows. The conditions necessary for them all to arise are

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awareness of sounds, and in all the other types ofawareness.

When these conditions are present in combinations, thebeings and lands come into being; when these conditionsare not present, the beings and lands ceased to be.

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Q&A

When you remain entirely untouched (stillness of mind) byconditions, whether or not they are present in combination,

you bring an end all the causes of coming into being andceasing to be.

At that moment, you will awaken to perfect enlightenment,which is your true nature and which neither comes intobeing or cease to be.

It is the pure, fundamental mind, the fundamental

everlasting enlightenment. (Shurangama Sutra) 13


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Chapter 6 Repentance and reform

Sutra:

Good Knowing Advisors, our physical body is an inn; itcannot be returned to.

Comments

Do not take refuge with your physical body by being a slave to

your body

because the physical body is just our possession like an innbut not our true permanent body/self.

When Bodhisattva Guanyin was practicing the profound prajna,he illuminated the five skandhas and saw that they are all

empty and he crossed beyond all suffering and difficulty. 14


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Sutra:

The three bodies of the Buddha exist within the self-natureof worldly people, but because they are confused, they do

not see the nature within them and so seek the threebodies of the Tathagata outside themselves. They do notsee that the three bodies of the Buddha are within their

.

Comments

Before you understand this principle, you need a good knowing

one to help guide you across by pointing to your own nature.

After you understand, you take your own nature across. 15


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Ultimately you have to take yourself across;

you have to walk the path because Buddhas merely showthe Path.

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Sutra:

Listen to what I say, for it can cause you to see the threebodies of your own self-nature within your own body. The

three bodies of the Buddha arise from your own self-natureand are not obtained from outside.

Comments

The precious pearl is within us; turn your light of attentioninwards.

Recognize your original mind and you will see your Buddha-

nature.

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Our original mind is pure without anything at all; in confusioneverything comes from it.

Our ori inal mind is wise without attachment to ood or evil.

Our original mind is in samadhi; the unmoving thusness that

unites with Reality.

Recognize the original mind and you will see the originalnature.

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Sutra:

What is the clear, pure Dharma-body Buddha? Theworldly persons nature is basically clear and pure, and the

ten thousand dharmas are produced from it. The thought ofevil produces evil actions and the thought of goodproduces good actions. Thus all dharmas exist within the

- .

Comments

The actual appearance of Reality is without appearance; there

isnt anything at all.

If people wish to understand the nature of the Dharma

Realm, everything is made by the mind alone. 19


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Basically the Buddha nature within us is without any attributes,

(true emptiness)

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and evil manifest within it (wonderful existence) and

it is explained in the Ten Suchness applicable to each of the10 Dharma Realms.

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As to that foremost, rare, and hard to understand Dharmaaccomplished by the Buddha, only the Buddhas and the

Buddha can exhaust the Real Appearance of all dharmas;that is to say, with regard to all dharmas: the suchness ofthe appearance, the suchness of the nature, the suchnesso e su s ance, e suc ness o e power, e suc nessof the function, the suchness of the causes, the suchnessof the conditions, the suchness of the effects, thesuchness of the retributionss and the suchness of the

ultimate equality from beginning to end.(The Dharma Flower SutraChapter 2 Expedient Device)

The Great Master Sixth Patriarch gives the analogy of theclouds in the sky to depict the suchness of people 21


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Sutra:

This is like the sky which is always clear, and the sun andmoon which are always bright, so that if they are obscured

by floating clouds it is bright above the clouds and darkbelow them. But if the wind suddenly blows and scattersthe clouds, there is brightness above and below, and the

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constantly drifts like those clouds in the sky.

Comments

The worldly person sometimes manifest his good nature andsometimes manifest his evil nature.

When we do more good, we ascend; the inverse appliesequally.

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Sutra:

Good Knowing Advisors, intelligence is like the sun andwisdom is like the moon. Intelligence and wisdom are

constantly bright, but if you are attached to external states,the floating clouds of false thought cover the self-nature sothat it cannot shine.

The pure mind is like the moon in water;

The quiet mind like a cloudless sky;

True blessings: the mind stopped, thoughts cut off;

True fields of blessing: all desires ended. 23


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Sutra:

If you meet a Good Knowing Advisor, if you listen to thetrue and right Dharma and cast out your own confusion

and falseness, then inside and out there will be penetratingbrightness, and within the self-nature all the ten thousanddharmas will appear. That is how it is with those who see

. , -

the Buddha.

Comments

A good knowing advisor does the job of the Buddha; it takesgood roots to meet one.

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Sutra:

If you meet a Good Knowing Advisor, if you listen to thetrue and right Dharma and cast out your own confusion

and falseness, then inside and out there will be penetratingbrightness, and within the self-nature all the ten thousanddharmas will appear. That is how it is with those who see

. , -

the Buddha.

Comments

First you listen to the good knowing one; then you practice byremoving our confusion and falseness (the false self).

When there is no more confusion, the clear, pure Dharma bodyof the Buddha within us remains.

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Sutra:

Good Knowing Advisors, when your own mind takesrefuge with your self-nature, it takes refuge with the true

Buddha. To take refuge is to rid your self-nature of egotismand unwholesome thoughts as well as of jealousy,obsequiousness, deceitfulness, contempt, pride, conceit,

,

whenever they arise.

Comments

Our own mind takes refuge with our inherent Buddha nature,the mahaprajnaparamita within us.

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Sutra:

Good Knowing Advisors, when your own mind takesrefuge with your self-nature, it takes refuge with the true

Buddha. To take refuge is to rid your self-nature of egotismand unwholesome thoughts as well as of jealousy,obsequiousness, deceitfulness, contempt, pride, conceit,

,

whenever they arise.Comments

Taking refuge is the intent to turnaround from being

unwholesome to wholesome and it begins with our thoughts.

The original self nature is without the self; turning around

comes when the false self comparing with others is put down.27


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Sutra:

To take refuge is to be always aware of your owntransgressions and never to speak of other peoples good

or bad traits. Always to be humble and polite is to havepenetrated to the self-nature without any obstacle. That istaking refuge.

A common habit is to look and compare with others, resulting inour mind not being able to return to the original stillness.

I see yet do not see.

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Sutra:

To take refuge is to be always aware of your owntransgressions and never to speak of other peoples good

or bad traits. Always to be humble and polite is to havepenetrated to the self-nature without any obstacle. That istaking refuge.

There is tendency to attach to the notion that our practice issuperior and being condescending towards others

thats why the Great Master reminds us to be humble andpolite to others.

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Sutra:

What is the perfect, full Reward-body of the Buddha? Justas one lamp can disperse the darkness of a thousand

years, one thought of wisdom can destroy ten thousandyears of delusion.

Comments

The perfect full Reward body is the greater transformation bodythat comes from our wisdom nature.

Wisdom is the reversal of delusion; it begins with our mind.

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Dedication of merit

May every living beings,

Our minds as one and radiant with light

Share the fruits of peace, with hearts of goodness

luminous and bright. If people hear and see, how hands and hearts can find in

giving unity

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and to joy. May kindness find reward; may all who sorrow leave their

grief and pain;

May this boundless light break the darkness of theirendless night.

Because our hearts are one, this world of pain turns intoparadise;

May all become compassionate and wise (2x)


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Dedication of merit

I vow that merit made from this deed will become,

Adornments for the Pure Land of Bu-ddhas. Repaying the four kinds of kindness above,

And aiding those in three paths below.

May all who see and hear of this deed Bring forth the resolve to reborn

In the Land of Ultimate Bliss.

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sixth patriarch's sutra january 18 lecture

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