The 5 Buddha Families, Talk 4

 

Today we're going to analyse the mental poison of ignorance and its pure aspect - the wisdom of the dharmadhatu, the embodiment of which is the Buddha Vairochana. Of the five families this is the one we call the Buddha family.

TWO ASPECTS OF ENLIGHTENMENT:

1) ABSOLUTE PURITY

Before starting we need to understand how we define the state of enlightenment. What is a Buddha? A Buddha in Tibetan is called Sangye, which has two syllables, the first is 'Sang', the second is 'gye' and these two syllables describe the meaning of the enlightened state very well. The first syllable 'Sang' means something like 'purify', that is when the five poisons have been totally purified, that means all the emotional and cognitive veils that are obstructing our mind are purified. Or we can say when the eight consciousnesses have been totally purified, or when the five aggregates have been totally purified, then there is a state of complete purity. Sang means absolute purity, absolute transparency which means complete freedom from suffering, freedom from all kinds of obstructions. It is a limitless state, a state of infinite freedom, without any veil at all, so it is like the purity of space. Of all the things we know there is nothing purer than space and this purity and freedom is a state of total peace. There is peace from all the conflict and turmoil in our minds and peace from all kinds of suffering. So that is 'Sang.'

2) COMPLETE PLENITUDE OF WISDOM, COMPASSION AND POWER

Simultaneously with this purity there is complete expansion or complete plenitude of wisdom, compassion, and power. All this comes simultaneously as, along the path, we become purified. Our qualities expand simultaneously, not one thing first and then the second one but it comes at the same time. So, 'gye', the second syllable, means expansion, plenitude, and it means especially the plenitude of the expansion of wisdom, compassion and power all together. It is as if the clouds are purified, so to speak, if we get rid of the clouds, then we have two things: first we have a total transparency and limitless freedom of clear space; and at the same time we have the total expansion of all the qualities that come from the sun such as warmth and light. The light is like the wisdom and the warmth is like the compassion and the energy of the sun which has the power to make things grow and make life proliferate. This is a good example for the enlightened state. 'Sangye' has these two aspects of purity and expansion or of space and wisdom, or emptiness and clarity. In two words we can say the state of enlightenment is a state of total emptiness and total clarity - this is the mind of the Buddha and what we call the dharmakaya.

THE BUDDHA IS THE DHARMAKAYA

What is the Buddha? The Buddha is the dharmakaya. This is really what the Buddha is. The dharmakaya has two aspects which, as we saw, are inseparable. One is the purity of emptiness, similar to space and the other is the fullness of all the qualities of wisdom, compassion and so on. Because of that, we distinguish two aspects of wisdom, which are the 'wisdom of suchness' and the 'wisdom of variety or multiplicity'. The wisdom of suchness means the awareness of emptiness, the awareness of this space; and the wisdom of multiplicity means the complete omniscience about everything that can manifest from that. So the awareness of suchness is the awareness of emptiness and the awareness of multiplicity is the clarity aspect. Of course these are always inseparable, but because we are dualistic people we can distinguish things and we separate them in terms of terminology. We distinguish, but we have to keep in mind that these things are indivisible in reality.

THE FOURTH KAYA

These two aspects are often called dharmakaya and svabhavikakaya. You know, there are normally three kayas - dharmakaya, sambhogakaya and nirmanakaya. Altogether this is what the Buddha is, but in terms of dharmakaya, these two aspects of dharmakaya are sometimes distinguished with these two names. The emptiness aspect of it is called svabhavikakaya which is like a container. Like space it contains everything. The aspect of clarity, of awareness which is inseparable from this container of emptiness is called the dharmakaya itself. The word dharmakaya emphasises the clarity aspect and the word svabhavikakaya emphasises the emptiness aspect which embraces everything. So all the kayas are manifestations of this svabhavikakaya emptiness. Everything is contained within that but we can distinguish these two and in terms of the five primordial wisdoms they are two of these five. This aspect of emptiness, svabhavikakaya, is the first wisdom we are going to look at. It is the dharmadhatu wisdom and I'm going to explain what it means now. The second one, the aspect of clarity, or dharmakaya is called the mirror-like wisdom and this we will see tomorrow.

DHARMADHATU WISDOM

We are going to first look at the enlightened aspect of this Buddha family. In the mandala of the five Buddhas; the Buddha family is the one in the centre. The Buddha family is the embodiment or the meaning of this first wisdom, the dharmadhatu wisdom. The dharmadhatu wisdom is what manifests when we are totally free from ignorance. When our ignorance is completely purified it becomes dharmadhatu wisdom. We can say the absence of ignorance is a state of complete transparency, a state of total lack of obstruction, a total lack of veils and a total lack of turbulence. Because of that we say that the quality of the absence of ignorance is like the quality of space, so the quality of space is the quality of the dharmadhatu wisdom. Dharmadhatu is a name, more or less, for this emptiness aspect of enlightenment. Dharmadhatu means the expanse of phenomena or the space of phenomena; the space that contains everything. We're not talking about outer space here; we're talking about absolute space, which is in the mind. So, Dharmadhatu means this container. It is the emptiness aspect, and what emptiness really means is the lack of inherent existence, so things appear very clearly but in reality nothing has true existence.

SPACE ALLOWS EVERYTHING TO HAPPEN

If we examine things very carefully to the last component we find nothing, everything is just space and this lack of reality is the dharmadhatu. This emptiness is what allows everything to happen. It is very important to understand that the essence of everything is emptiness and this is the only possible way that things can exist. Normally we think the other way round. We think "oh, things exist so how can everything be emptiness if things exist?" Emptiness looks like nothing exists. But it is not like that, because if things exist it is because they are empty. If they were not empty they would not be able to exist. Do you understand? If there were no space, nothing could be there. If everything is there, it's because everything is made of space. Really! Space is always there, space is what allows things to be present. Even if we put a solid block of iron here, this solid bock of iron is not going to obstruct space. Space is always unobstructed and that is what allows this solid block to be present here.

EMPTINESS IS THE ONLY WAY THAT THINGS CAN 'BE'

Student:
Does it mean there can be no movement without space?
Lama Jinpa:
Not only no movement, but no manifestation either. You know, if there was no space nothing could manifest anywhere. There would be no space for anything to manifest so space is the necessary fundamental quality of all material things. In same way, if things really existed on their own then they would never change. They would always be there and they would never change at all. They would always be in the same place, always exactly the same, forever and nothing exists like that. Everything is fluid. The way things exist is in an impermanent fluid way, which appears to be solid but it is because they are not solid that they can exist and appear and change. If things were not emptiness, if everything existed inherently, then the world would become totally solidified, fixed for ever and there would be no way that things could change. If things can change, if good things can become bad things, and bad things can become good, if we can change ourselves, and improve, if we can get old, and all these things, it is because our nature and the nature of everything is emptiness. Do you understand? Things cannot be any other way, if you think properly. So emptiness is actually not a very strange thing that the Buddha invented; it is the only way that things can be!

EMPTINESS IS NOT NOTHINGNESS

When we talk about emptiness we never talk about nothingness. Emptiness means precisely the potentiality for everything to manifest, so emptiness is inseparable from its clarity of manifestation. Emptiness is not an empty inert space that we fall into when we get enlightened. It is not like that. Emptiness contains within itself the potentiality for everything to exist, therefore emptiness is always full, emptiness is never empty. Emptiness is never a nothing-ness, an empty space. It doesn't exist like that. Emptiness is not empty of the clarity of its manifestation.

EVERYTHING COMES FROM EMPTINESS

Anyway, this is the dharmadhatu. Dharmadhatu is the infinite container of everything and the three kayas of the Buddha are nothing other than the dharmadhatu, they are part of the dharmadhatu and the eight consciousnesses and the five poisons come from this dharmadhatu. The five wisdoms are part of the dharmadhatu. Everything is contained in or is part of or is manifested from this dharmadhatu - infinite space. Everything comes out of that, exists in that and dissolves into that. Everything that manifests, whether it is in samsara or in nirvana, appears "out of" this infinite space of dharmadhatu. While they stay they are always part of that, never beyond that, never outside of the dharmadhatu and when they disappear they disappear into that again.

MIND SEEING ITSELF SEES THE DHARMADHATU

The wisdom of the dharmadhatu is just the recognition of that. When the mind sees itself, then what it sees is the dharmadhatu. The realisation of what we're trying to achieve in the practice of dharma is this realisation, this direct perception of the emptiness of our own minds, which is the emptiness of everything. Then we're totally free, totally limitless and we have infinite potential. This realisation is similar to seeing space. Space is everywhere; it is something that is always here. All the time we have it in front of our noses but we're not able to see space, are we? In the same way this dharmadhatu is the true nature of everything, and the essence of our own minds; however, how can we see that? It is very difficult. That's why visualisation is so difficult because it's not something we can see. "Oh, now I've seen the emptiness"! To see our own minds is very difficult because there's nothing to see. To know how to see without seeing, this is the realisation of this dharmadhatu; it is the Mahamudra realisation, the emptiness realisation, and all these different names. When one has this vision without seeing, this direct realisation, this is the wisdom of the dharmadhatu. It is the total absence of obscuration, or confusion, or veil, or darkness in the mind. So this is the wisdom of the dharmadhatu.

VAIROCHANA IN SUMMARY

In brief we can say Vairochana represents this infinite space, primordially pure and all pervading with its power of manifesting everything, so it contains this infinite power too, or potentiality of manifestation. It is therefore that, from which everything manifests, where everything resides, and where everything finally dissolves. It has no centre and no limits. No beginning and no end. It is beyond thoughts, beyond descriptions, beyond everything that we know in our way of perceiving and at the same time it is the essence of all of us and contains everything.

We call it dharmadhatu wisdom, we call it Vairochana, we can also call it svabhavikakaya and at other times we call it dharmakaya directly. We can also describe it sometimes as prajnaparamita, the mother of all Buddhas because it has a feminine connotation of space. It is like the womb where everything arises from, and in a way it is the womb where everything goes at the end. Space. So sometimes it is called the mother of all the Buddhas, or the great mother,

WHEN DHARMADHATU IS NOT RECOGNISED

Now we're going to see what happens when this is ignored. When this wisdom is veiled by ignorance, in other words, when the dharmadhatu is not recognised then it becomes the ground consciousness. Now the ground consciousness, as I said yesterday, can be talked about in two aspects. If it is compared to the ocean, (which it often is) the ocean will have two sides. One is the depth of it, which contains lots of things, and the other one is the surface, which reflects light. So here especially it is the aspect of its depth. When the mind doesn't recognise its own emptiness then it becomes obscure. Non-recognition means absence of space, absence of transparency, amongst all the qualities we have already seen. So the absence of that is the opposite, which is darkness. It is a lack of transparency, it is obstruction. Basically, it is darkness. So it is unconsciousness, unawareness.

GROUND CONSCIOUSNESS IS THE DEPTH OF THE UNCONSCIOUS

Essentially this aspect of the ground consciousness is unawareness, lack of awareness, unconsciousness. Like a deep sleep it is like darkness. Ignorance means not knowing, not being aware, and this non-recognition of emptiness therefore creates the very first split in our minds. The beginning of samsara is when the mind doesn't recognise emptiness; at that moment this unity of emptiness and clarity which is everything becomes split into two, which we can call light and darkness. We'll talk about light tomorrow (when we discuss the Vajra family) but the aspect of darkness is what ignorance is and this darkness is the deep profound ground consciousness that contains all the seeds for our experience in existence. It is the storeroom aspect of alaya consciousness. It is the aspect of ground consciousness that is full with all the latent tendencies accumulated from time without beginning and therefore it contains all the potentiality for experiencing all types of existences in samsara. It is a container of all the karmic seeds, the container of all memories and of all the impressions we have accumulated through our thoughts and our actions. These are all latently dormant, unconsciously there in this ocean. This lack of consciousness or awareness and this depth of dark container which is our fundamental consciousness is the essence of ignorance. So we have here again the meaning of a container that contains everything. All the potentiality of samsara is contained in the ground consciousness. Even though this ground consciousness (in its aspect of storehouse) is in itself unaware, all these impressions that are contained have the active potential of manifestation, so there is an enormous energy dormant there.

WE ARE MOVED BY UNSEEN ENERGIES

In the same way that the emptiness has the potentiality of manifesting everything, the ground consciousness is kind of sleeping there, but with the enormous potentiality to manifest everything in our consciousness. That's how we often behave and react in our daily lives. Much of the time, in many ways we function moved by these energies which are unconscious. For example, on a physical level, our body is the embodiment of that. Our bodies function totally unconsciously; we don't have to think how to make the body work. The body functions by itself. How? Because of the laws of nature, of the energy which is contained in an unconscious way in the body itself. These energies have enormous power to make our bodies function, it's like a miracle isn't it? Our heart is pumping all the time. We don't have to think or tell the heart "please pump" every time. It does it by itself. There is enormous energy there functioning all the time; so much extremely complicated and fantastic activity going on in our bodies. And all this is functioning by itself, because somewhere, for us, in this ground consciousness all the energies for this are contained.

OFTEN OUR MINDS ARE ON 'AUTO'

Moving our bodies is unconscious and in the same way, our minds also are moved by latent dormant energies. So many of our reactions are automatic. A simple example: if we have learned something, and then we have memorised it, and become accustomed to it, then later on we can do that particular activity without thinking about it, like driving a car or just talking. Talking: we don't have to think of every word we have to use, it just comes out, we know what to say. This is because we have learned, we have studied, we have memorised, we have become familiar and have impressed in our memories and then this has the power to be able to make us do that activity without thinking about it. It is an unconscious activity and it all comes from this storehouse of the ground consciousness.

DREAMS ARE THE EXPRESSION OF STORED TENDENCIES

Another example is dreaming. Sleeping is the paradigm of ignorance. It is the most essential state of ignorance. It is total ignorance, total unconsciousness, It is like plunging completely into the ground consciousness. Instead of the clear space of emptiness we have total obscuration, total unrecognition and then we interpret it as total unconsciousness, lack of clarity. Then from that come all the manifestations of dreams. When we dream, the latent tendencies accumulated in the ground consciousness come up to the surface and then they function on their own without us deciding or participating at all. We are totally carried along by them in our dreams. We cannot modify anything, it just appears according to what we have stored in our ground consciousness. These energies have their own force and they will manifest in the symbolic images of the dreams which are actually the expression of the powerful energies contained in our unconscious. For example, we may dream of a tiger attacking us. So this tiger is just the expression of a very powerful emotion, maybe anger, that is contained in our unconscious. If we are angry people, then we go to sleep very peacefully and then this tiger appears and runs after us because there is a lot of turmoil and anguish in our minds. It's a very powerful thing. That is an example of how inside our ground consciousness there are very powerful latent energies which manifest in dreams but they also manifest in our daily patterns of conduct and reaction. It is like having a sheet of paper with iron filings on it. When you put a magnet underneath, it makes the filings move and organise into different patterns and shapes. What appears on the surface -consciousness - is moved by unconscious forces below. We act so often like this. Animals function most of the time like that. Animals are totally automatic. Of course they are a little bit aware of struggling but they never change things. They just continue repeating the same patterns of conduct for millions of years. So they are totally dominated and carried by these automatic energies. So this is very important to understand, in terms of ignorance.

EMPTINESS BECOMES THE MATERIAL UNIVERSE

This is the inner experience of the ground consciousness, the basic energy of ignorance but it manifests in different ways in our experience. In the outer world this is perceived, we make this division between light and dark. So in the consciousness side, light and dark means conscious or unconscious. Now we have examined all this unconscious, dark side of us which contains so many good and bad things. There are a lot of monsters residing in our ground consciousness, many things that we have hidden there which have been repressed and negated. Everything goes down there, they don't disappear, and then they create all kinds of complexes and mental problems and all kinds of things. Then in the outer world we have light and dark, also in the sense of a container and what is contained. Matter is the darkness side of the outer world that we perceive; the material aspect of the universe is dark. The beings who inhabit this world who are the embodiment of life, they are the light aspect. Also we can say that within our own beings we have the body and we have the mind. The body is the material aspect of us and this is the dark side of us because matter is something that is inert; it doesn't talk, it doesn't think and it is not alive by itself. Of course it has all this energy but it is not alive. Our mind is the alive part of it, that which is aware of things. So the body is the dark side, and the body is the container also; so, emptiness has become the body. In a way, emptiness has become the material universe and the material universe, or the nature, again, is the dark aspect, but at the same time it has the enormous power of functioning by itself. You know, nature has its own laws. Nobody has to direct nature and tell it what to do. There is an enormous power going on and all kinds of energies which make nature develop and evolve and change and move. There is enormous potentiality contained in the darkness of ignorance.

LIMITLESS SPACE HAS BECOME A LIMITED BODY

This is the fundamental nature of ignorance. Basically it's a state of limitation, a state of obstruction. Instead of limitless freedom we have limitless limitation in terms of space and time. Like the body, everything which is material, is totally limited. What was limitless space has become a totally limited body for us. We have become solidified into a tiny piece of flesh and in fact everything has become solidified. When there is non-recognition of the emptiness, then the mind interprets reality as 'I' and 'other' and we believe in the true existence of 'I' and the true existence of outer phenomena. This means that we solidify our concepts about 'I am' and about all the other things out there, and this solidification of things is what manifests as our material universe and our own body and also many other things. So this is ignorance and the solidification of reality.

THE ARCHETYPE OF BEING IN THE WOMB

We can mention a couple of other things to help us understand what this means. One is to consider the development of a human being. The state that corresponds to ignorance is the pre-birth state of existing in the womb, the embryonic state. When we are in the womb we are totally inactive, totally dormant and totally carried by nature, the nature of the mind. At the same time lots of things are developing and happening without us intervening, so it is the same state. At the same time we are deeply submerged in the ocean of the womb and carried by all these energies. This is also one of the best symbols, or archetypes, for the meaning of the state of ignorance. In general terms, this is what it means.

THE ENERGY OF IGNORANCE IS OUR ANIMAL NATURE

Another thing I like to relate to ignorance (this is just my own thinking) is the story of the evolution of humankind, according to how modern people understand that. According to that, humans evolved over a long period of time from primates. Slowly, what happened for them to become human is that they woke from the animal mentality. The animal mentality is the mentality of total automatic functioning without any awareness of oneself. There is really no distinction of clear consciousness of 'I am' - 'I' am 'I' and 'you' are 'you.' It is just an automatic function. The laws of nature govern animal mentality. When animals evolve into humans the human mentality is characterised by becoming aware of 'I'. Becoming aware of 'I' separate from nature. The beginning of this self-awareness of humanity is like getting out of the womb of animal mentality, like waking up, like being born. So here, talking about ignorance, we are still in the animal state. We still haven't gained self-consciousness so we're still not humans. It is the state of being human before there is the awareness of separateness from nature.