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Thanks for going over this! I go to my local branch of the Kwan-um school of Korean zen buddhism, and we chant this every week. Good to get another in-depth perspective on its meaning.
Exactly right, except that the Mahayana emphasizes the meditation on the mind more than other meditation objects. It is my understanding that the Mahayana is selective in the means of the cultivation of liberation from the samsara.
Wow, that was a bit hard to follow for someone far less familiar with the Mahayana such as myself. Looking forwards to your follow up video explaining how we can see it in context. Cheers Doug 🙏🏻
18:15 not born and not ceased doesn’t mean that things are not changing. A tree transformed into wooden table, wooden table over time transformed into dust, dust overtime transformed into something else.. that’s the characteristic of emptiness.. There’s no true tree, no true table, and no true dusts.. if there’s a tree, a table and dusts. Then they won’t change. A tree never born, the seeds of the tree is from all other “transformation” as well.. eg: water, sunshine, chemicals in the seeds, etc.. All phenomena are concepts… not independent, they are all interdependent …
Formal Zen practitioner here. One Zen teacher i know said, "when are you a good person? When you're eating an ice cream cone? No, when you're eating an ice cream cone you're just eating an ice cream cone." Has been a useful teaching for me related to the heart sutra and emptiness more generally. Doug always bringing the dharma. I started watching when you were doing videos in the park and in front of that fireplace mantel. I miss the park backdrop! Though I'm sure the sound issues were a nightmare.
Thanks very much! That fireplace doesn't exist anymore, we redid it after our house fire. I do occasional videos outside, but indeed it's difficult with the weather and the sound.
Very nice introduction to the Heart Sutra! During the time that I attended the Zendo, it was chanted after morning meditation every day. Form and emptiness are sometimes equivalent to wisdom and compassion, or to wisdom and skillful means as the components necessary to produce enlightenment. In such systems, prajna paramita is the balance to the other 5 paramitas (giving, morality, patience, vigor, dhyana), and when that apposition is characterized in art, Prajnaparamita (personified) is female, the other 5 are 'direction' buddhas. It's interesting to hear your discussion of the sutra because I've always heard it presented as an expression of the ineffability of enlightenment.
No matter how much I listen to Mahayana folks talk about their path, they just don't make sense to me, and I really get the impression that they also don't understand it. I know the focus is to stop thinking about it and just start meditating, but honestly the incomprehensibility is sort of a turn off to me. I've been following the Theravada tradition for a few years and it make so much sense to me. I understand why I must meditate and what the goal is and it motivates me to be diligent. But, what ever path is chosen, I wish everyone peace, happiness and freedom from suffering.
Right, there are many paths for many different folks. Good to have a passing knowledge of each, but also good to find one that resonates with you personally.
Thanks for another great video, I was actually searching through your channel last week looking for this exact topic and was surprised it wasn't covered, and perfect timing here it is!
Thank you for this video, I am a lay zen Buddhism practitioner and find early Buddhism perspectives interesting and enriching ( and very different :) . As I am not a scholar ( or a Buddha) , please forgive my ignorance , but the heart sutra is very central in zen . The way we learn it , the sutra is a perfect example of zazen practice ( sitting meditation) when we sit and experience the interconnection of all things, each manifestation of the big mind ( the universe basically) has a form which is only a manifestation of the total function of causality , in that sense - emptiness is form and form is emptiness. The 5 scandas are like this as well , they exist, but they too are formations of one interconnected universe which is fundamentally one. While zen might be somewhat remote from early Buddhism practice, I think it might be an interesting reference to consider. 🙏
Yes these ideas of "big mind" and an interconnected universe are background ideas stemming from other sutras and other early schools of Buddhism that have found their way into Zen interpretations of the Heart Sutra. For more on interconnection see my video on Indra's Net: ua-cam.com/video/CQN7sVmckso/v-deo.html
Just picked up a nice first edition of Red Pines translation last week. On a past trip to Japan, I bought a mala bracelet at one of the Temples around Mt.Takao that had the heart sutra engraved on it among all the beads.
Nice to have an easy one for a change: When it says: “Therefore, Shariputra, in emptiness there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no memory and no consciousness; …” It means that in the enlightened state (in emptiness), all of these things go away (out of awareness), and not to carry them with you (any more than you would carry around the raft you took to reach the other shore). Where it gets tricky is how these terms would be considered in the enlightened state? Perhaps you could say that they are transformed: from form into no-form, …, as mind changes into no-mind (mushin), and thought to no-thought (wu-nien).
All of the teachings we learn from the Buddha including the four Noble Truths and Eightfold path is to be free of attachment, In Nibanna any attachment to anything experienced or of the impermanent words is empty of any meaning. The only way for one to ends suffering is to no longer crave the need to exist and free oneself of worldly attachments and free of all Samsara experience in all forms. All beings in Samsara including Deva are Suffering from the endless need to permanently exist in an impermanent world.
Thanks for the video, dear Doug. Have you read the interpretation that Jayarava has proposed for the text? His views seem very heterodox compared to what I've read in most sources. However, in my not-at-all-expert opinion, his ideas seem highly reasonable enough and worthy of consideration. Kind regards!
At first glance, the message in this short sutra may be somewhat self-contradicting and confusing. However, the sutra indeed encapsulates the very essence of “emptiness” and the practice of Middle Way. To make it a little easier to comprehend the message in this sutra, it will be quite helpful for the time being to imagine “Emptiness” being an empty space. Whatever put into that empty space transforms that empty space into itself as far as human eyes are concerned. We often see only what occupies the space and completely ignore the space itself. That is, in our perception, the empty space has become whatever object is put there. Thus “form is emptiness, emptiness is form”, and the same applies to the other four skandhas. However, everything in the world is temporary. The space was empty to begin with, and whatever placed in that space will eventually deteriorate and transform into something else and disperse away from that space, leaving that space behind and that space becomes empty again. Thus, “in emptiness there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no memory and no consciousness, … , no attainment and no non-attainment.” This does not mean that “emptiness” is equivalent to an “empty space”. Emptiness is merely a nature, not anything we can see or feel. The statement “in emptiness, there is no form, …”, further states that in essence, everything is nothing to begin with. Yet we constantly create things and concepts to serve some purpose(s). In fact, without purpose, nothing exists in the human sense. This doesn’t mean there is no existence, human simply transforms whatever exist into what they want them to be for some purposes. All purposes are self-serving, thus creating conflicts among all living beings when different purposes within a population or between populations do not agree with each other, resulting in negative karma and endless sufferings. Thus, “without attainment, bodhisattvas take refuge in Prajnaparamita and live without walls of the mind ….”
I believe the mantra connected with the teachings of Prajnaparamita teachings is to be seen as an encapsulation or essential condensation of the entire teachings. It works as a kind of a key which opens the doors to the wisdom of Prajnaparamita. It is the essential nature of all phenomena encapsulated within a few words that functions as a formula for the direct experience of the Prajnaparamita nature of reality. It can also be seen as a kind of seal that keeps all wisdom within it. We can also approach this mantra as a form of bridge between the world of spoken teachings into the realms of direct experience. Just like the use of other forms of mantras it contains the power to bring forth the direct experience of the Prajnaparamita reality beyond the horizons of mere intellectual understanding and into the immediate realisation which doesn’t really on words or the thinking capacities of the mind any longer. In a way, a mantra is an instrument of immediacy rather than progression. This particular mantra is regarded as a heart mantra because of its direct connection with the Prajnaparamita wisdom which, in essence, teaches us about the true nature not being a product of a progressive path but rather the true nature itself, which is never separate from our experiences. Always present. Never separated from our reality. For that reason the mantra of Prajnaparamita is a supreme mantra of purification since it carries no stains of provisionality to it. It cannot be separated from true nature itself and is therefor both the means and the end towards the realisation of Prajnaparamita wisdom. It is both the bridge over and the final destination since Prajnaparamita is not a gradual path but truth itself.
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It is the nature of unenlightened person to try to cling to something. In the Buddha's day, it was the Self (atta/ atman). So Buddha claimed that those things are not self (anatta/ anatman). Later on a question arise: if there is no self, who inherit karma in reincarnation? A sect try to answer this by saying that there is no self, but there is an individual (puggala). They got the name Puggalavada. These got rejected later because people then cling to this concept of puggala as new Self. Later there is Abhidharma movement that systemize Buddha's teaching by classifying all phenomena (dharma) in the world. When defining a phenomena, an idea arise that there is intrinsic nature (svabhava) in each phenomena. Fire is hot, water is wet, this is timeless truth. This has appeal because suffering and its end and the path to end suffering - are also timeless phenomena. Then came the idea that timeless truth must be The TRUTH (DHARMA), and so that must exist in some way. And there is also wordplay here, svabhava can also mean "own being/ self existence". And so a phenomena (dharma) that has intrinsic nature (svabhava) of timeless truth (dharma) must have intrinsic existence (svabhava). Not surprising that people could get entangled and cling to these self existent phenomena as new object of attachment. And so Prajnaparamita aim to unravel this new attachments. By saying "Svabhava-sunya" - empty of svabhava. This new claim can also be new object of attachment. And so Nagarjuna said "sunyata-sunyata" = the emptiness of emptiness. Don't try to replace reality with concept of emptiness, that's just another delusion.
Thank you for this exploration of the Heart Sutra, Doug. Having all the background material is very helpful. Like you mentioned, this sutta tends to stimulate the intellect. My view is that this sutra can only be fully understood from a phenomenological point of view. The first result as it appears in section III, is what Thomas Metzinger has called a “minimal phenomenal experience”(MPE). In these episodes of “pure consciousness” there are no perceptions. Only “vast emptiness”. Could the Heart Sutra be an attempt to direct the practitioner to the direct experience of this?
I always assumed that its negation of traditional Buddhist conceptual formulations was less a sectarian conflict and more an admonition against intellectualism eclipsing direct personal experience of the path and its consequences. I just assumed a sort of paradoxical complementarity, typical of zen.
Emptiness is form, form is emptiness. As above, so below. Emptiness arises with form for form cannot exist without empitness and vise versa. They are 2 sides of the same coin.
Lovely video and interesting questions. Is it not the prasangika method of investigation reliant on refutation and not affirmation. On that basis, it can be understood why there is there no such affirmation followed by negation. Such as there is emptiness but no self existent impermanence. Even the briefest of affirmations would posit true existence which would be impossible from the get go.
For people who practice and follow the Dharma, the Heart Sutra doesn’t actually offer much. First reach Nirvana, then you’ll see that there are no more questions. The fact that people think that they can become like The Buddha after nirvana through personal “will”, have lost the way. After nirvana, things happen. You don’t “do” much. What happens will be an ocean of kindness, from our perspective. That is just the natural way of the world, without ignorance, beyond suffering. Over philosophising is not the way. Remain steadfast in your practice. Namo Buddhaya 🙏
Great video considering the enigma and challenges in explaining the Heart Sutra. But have to say more than a little disappointed that there was no mention of the current scholars who have published valuable work on or pertaining to the the Heart Sutra e.g. Attwood, Huifeng/Orsborn and Nattier. Why are they continued to be ignored by the mainstream academia? ❤
There is so much work on the Heart Sutra that it is impossible to include it all, or even a representative sample, in a short video like this. You would need a dissertation.
When a being discovers they are nothing of impermanence only experiencing impermanence they discover that nothing they gained from impermanence belongs to the empty formless being. Beginning at Birth a Being takes a form, the Being existing before form being taken. The form cannot exist without the Being, the Being existing without form. Everything taken is something never belonging to the empty formless self and everything only exists if a being takes it. Nothing impermanent belongs to any being that isn’t impermanant. The state of Nibanna is to no longer attach and crave including form or the need to exist and experience Samsara
Somehow, the theory of relativity of Einstein is correlated to the teachings of Buddhism. Matter and energy is exchangeable and forever indestructible. There is no inconsistency in this sutra.
I don't think the statements "X is emptiness and emptiness is X" are supposed to "mean" something. It says that everything is empty (lacking svabhava), and thus no concept can make sense. Also kamma is empty, and dhamma, too. That's why nibbana = samsara without ignorance. So as far as you have samsara, there is dukkha. You will have dukkha always as far as there is co-arisen things, and not wanting to change that is nibbana. The passage "there is no change etc." just means: change is defined by humans, the path is defined by humans etc., they do not exist inherently. That's why the diamond sutta says "the Buddhadhamma is not perfect, and thus it's perfect" (roughly). It does never say that change is impossible. It's just that you can say "A is ehhwbsbhf7en" and then say "A changed to fhejjwifjbe". Both are made up. At least those are my interpretations of course.
Nibbana is not samsara without ignorance. Yogacara philosophy is erroneous when it states that, samsaric life is dukkha and even the Lord Buddha still faced immense dukkha even after perfect bodhi. Change happens regardless, a human need not be present for it to happen because all conditioned things are marked by anicca, dukkha, anatta. Diamond Sutra gets this wrong because it states how all phenomena is mind created, while the Lord Buddha specifically said that mind is created from dhammas and not dhammas created from mind. If change were defined by humans then we would all wish to never change into an old person, yet our kamma dictates otherwise. I hope you can see the compassion in my words and I hope you find peace and grow in happiness 🙏
@@be1tube it is indeed a curiosity. Other Prajnaparamita sutra has The Buddha himself as narrator, or Manjusri. As far as I remember, this is the only Prajnaparamita sutra with Avalokitesvara as narrator. There is that theory about Heart Sutra was composed in China, as summary recitation from larger Prajnaparamita sutra - translation by Kumarajiva. Maybe the chinese monk who composed it was a worshipper of Avalokitesvara.
I like the heart sutra. In my opinion, from a scientific viewpoint there is no truly "self". Because looking deeply atom (carbon, oxygen, nitrogen,..) are "floating around" like lego building cells that becomes us. I agree with the word "Interbeing" from plumvillage. I personally think not to take avalokiteshwara too serious as a real person but more philosophical : "deep understanding" which is the teacher of awakening or Buddha and both is found in ones heart. The other sore is a place that ones is truly free. We don't need to practice in order to get the result in the future. "The real meaning of the word 'birth' as the Buddha meant it is not the birth from a mother's womb, that's too physical. The birth that the Buddha was pointing to was spiritual, the birth of clinging to 'I' and 'mine'. In one day there can be hundreds of births; the amount depends on a person's capacity, but in each birth the 'I' and 'mine' arises, slowly fades, and gradually disappears and dies. Shortly, on contact with a sense-object, another arises. Each birth generates a reaction that carries over to the next. This is what is called the kamma of a previous life ripening in the present birth. It is then transmitted further. Every birth is like this." -Buddhadasa By the way... I respect other options. One beautiful story I would like to share. "After a fload in Chiang Mai a group monks and novice from Theravada temple helped to clean up Mahayana temple peacefully .
An atom is a form, but an atom itself is made out of emptiness (99.99999999999999% empty, while proton and neutron is not a form but tornado like energy - the make up of proton and neutron, while electron is a point like with no form). So in emptiness (the true nature of an atom) has no form but through emptiness a concept of form appears (like an atom). There is no language/words to describe emptiness bcuz it's meant to be experienced. The attachment to words/anything usually restricts our understanding of Dhamma. Nihilism/nothingness is an attachment to the word empty which is dangerous, while the attachment to form will produce materialism. Words/ideology/faith if not fully understood will become attachments.
Personal perspective is important. It is what everything boils down to. The texts and writings only provide a generalized idea. These are also limited by what human language can attempt to describe. Personalized experiences complete it.
To piggy back off my first comment as well, another misunderstanding is the question everyone struggles with "If there is no self, then what is reborn?" The Buddha never taught that there wasn't no self. He taught what you believe to be self is actually a temporary self of aggregates. So what is reborn is another temporary self of aggregates. The question is null, because it starts off with a lie. It claims the Buddha never taught about self. Buddha did teach about self. He said it's five aggregates, and he taught it continues to be reborn through karma. What will be reborn is another temporary, impermanent self made up of aggregates, just like the one you have now, ad infinitum until realization of emptiness ( Nirvana) Namo Buddha 🙏
A Dharma being irreducible does not take away its emptiness. Emptiness simply means it is dependently originated. That doesn't steal away that Matter is irreducible. Matter is dependently originated/empty, and also irreducible. It is a subtle misunderstanding to say that something has self nature, and that it exists as "alone by itself". The khandas are irreducible, yes, and also they are empty. Emptiness is not taking a chair in the room and breaking it down to its atoms to reduce it to its most irreducible component of the four elements which are indeed self nature and irreducible. Rather, Emptiness is taking the chair in the room and seeing it's caused and conditioned by everything before it. Without the rain, the chair could not exist, since the tree needs rain, the chair needs tree for the wood. Emptiness is saying there is nothing that exists "seperately" from everything else, nothing has its own independent essence that is split from everything else, and here in where there is subtle confusing with that line of wording where people read "self nature" as not being empty, no that's not the case. The khandas are irreducible, upon analyzing reality you cannot go break sankharas like "thought, down further. Thought, is just thought. So it has self nature because it is irreducible, but it is still Anatta/emptiness/dependently originated (all synonymous) because it does not have self nature"seperate" that exists in its own. Thought is conditioned. Rocks don't have thought, they don't have the causes and conditions to have thought. If I put you under anesthesia, you don't have thought. Hope this is helpful. Wonderful video as usual Doug thanks 🙏 Can you provide an academic source to me that states an early school using the heart sutra as a rebuttal to sarvastivadins abhidhamma?
These scholars may have taken it as a refutation of the core teachings of Buddhism, but I take it as a reinforcement of the core teachings of Buddhism as they are all interconnected theorems based on linear lines of logic. Therefore the talk about a “higher path” to a “higher” and more “eternal” enlightenment without direct experience is just conjecture and idle/wishful thinking spurned by the ego’s desires. Let’s just say hypothetically that there was a so-called higher stage. What good is it if you can’t even attain a lower stage to begin with? The Buddha has claimed to achieve the highest state of being free of suffering forever and taught the methods of achieving that goal. Is that simply not good enough? What more could you want?
The Buddha never said any of this and Avalokiteshvara is not a real human. These are ACTUAL Facts. Please recognize. None of this is authentic. It was created by the Chinese who later translated it to Sanskrit. It is nothing but Mahayana propaganda to put down early (Theravada) Buddhism. The Source Material is Very important and with this Sutra, it's just not credible. BTW I am a Zen practitioner of over 30 years and have recited this thousands of times in my life.
Table is form, but there’s no such thing called as a table. Tables are made of atoms, and atoms are vibrations… Form is emptiness, emptiness is form. So is the self, the table, the mind, etc… … The Buddha in Tipitaka against nihilism and eternalism … If no self meaning not existence self = nihilism.. if self is in existence , then it’s eternalism.. So, it’s true that form is emptiness, emptiness is form.
J Krishnamurti made the whole of the complex and obscure Buddhist doctrine and practices irrelevant , that is unless you are attached to Buddhism and can't let it go.
0:21 “It covers more of the Buddha’s teachings than any other scripture” That is false. In fact, the Buddha is not even present in the Prajnaparamita Sutra. The Prajnaparamita Sutra is a dialogue between Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva and Sariputra. Shakyamuni Buddha is not present at all. It is Avalokiteshvara’s teachings, not Shakyamuni Buddha.
It’s not false. The sutra itself states that Avalokiteshvara spoke by the power of the Buddha who was present in the gathering, and to applauded his explanation to Sariputra.
@@ALIEN_857 The Lord Buddha never said they were illusory, nowhere in the Pali Suttas does he claim that. If he did then it would not be in conjunction with dependent origination
@@ewkeenan The name Avalokiteshvara is no where found in the Pali Suttas, nor does any amount of what is meant in the Heart Sutra found in the Pali Suttas as well
The most famous Buddhist scripture is maybe the Kama Sutra. There have been films, videos, books, coloring books... in all possible languages, not that there's a lot of talking anyway.
Kama Sutra? There is a Kama Sutta in the Pali Tradition in which the Buddha speaks on the harm of sensual pleasure. The Kama Sutra, that is the famous sexual text which goes over sexual positions and poses, is not a Buddhist text. Many will say it’s a Hindu text but this is not true either as it doesn’t conform to any of the teachings in the Vedas, including the Upanishads as well as other foundational texts like the Bhagavad Gita or Srimad Bhagavatam. Otherwise, it would not be encouraging lust and sexual pleasure. Therefore, it would not apply to Buddhist teaching or Hindu teaching.
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Very nice to see you making videos on the Mahāyāna Sūtras Doug! Please do the Lotus Sūtra also in future. 🙏🏻 ☸️
Also the oldest printed example of a religious text yet discovered: The Diamond Sutra.
I discussed the Lotus Sūtra a bit in my videos on "skillful means" in Buddhism, starting with: ua-cam.com/video/ZIyykKhN1Pk/v-deo.html
Words and concepts don’t point to inherently real things.?
Thanks for going over this! I go to my local branch of the Kwan-um school of Korean zen buddhism, and we chant this every week. Good to get another in-depth perspective on its meaning.
My pleasure!
Thanks for doing the Heart Sutra. It resonates for a lot of us who have taken the Refuges -- it's the Heart of the Mahayana and so concise.
I've been watching your videos for several years. I appreciate what you do.
Awesome, thank you!
Heart Sutra's main tenet is the detachment of the mind from the 5 sensory objects. It is never easy to let go of these.
But isn’t that what the Pali Canon is already about? Why the need to break with the so-called Hinayana if that is the case?
Exactly right, except that the Mahayana emphasizes the meditation on the mind more than other meditation objects. It is my understanding that the Mahayana is selective in the means of the cultivation of liberation from the samsara.
Wow, that was a bit hard to follow for someone far less familiar with the Mahayana such as myself. Looking forwards to your follow up video explaining how we can see it in context. Cheers Doug 🙏🏻
Very concise and well articulated presentation. Well done.
Thank you kindly!
Avalokitesvara, the supposed teacher of this Sutra, is the quintessential Bodhisattva for compassion. I’ve always found this interesting.
Whoa! Deep! Great job Doug.
Glad you enjoyed it!
18:15 not born and not ceased doesn’t mean that things are not changing. A tree transformed into wooden table, wooden table over time transformed into dust, dust overtime transformed into something else.. that’s the characteristic of emptiness..
There’s no true tree, no true table, and no true dusts.. if there’s a tree, a table and dusts. Then they won’t change.
A tree never born, the seeds of the tree is from all other “transformation” as well.. eg: water, sunshine, chemicals in the seeds, etc..
All phenomena are concepts… not independent, they are all interdependent …
Formal Zen practitioner here. One Zen teacher i know said, "when are you a good person? When you're eating an ice cream cone? No, when you're eating an ice cream cone you're just eating an ice cream cone." Has been a useful teaching for me related to the heart sutra and emptiness more generally. Doug always bringing the dharma. I started watching when you were doing videos in the park and in front of that fireplace mantel. I miss the park backdrop! Though I'm sure the sound issues were a nightmare.
Thanks very much! That fireplace doesn't exist anymore, we redid it after our house fire. I do occasional videos outside, but indeed it's difficult with the weather and the sound.
Very nice introduction to the Heart Sutra! During the time that I attended the Zendo, it was chanted after morning meditation every day. Form and emptiness are sometimes equivalent to wisdom and compassion, or to wisdom and skillful means as the components necessary to produce enlightenment. In such systems, prajna paramita is the balance to the other 5 paramitas (giving, morality, patience, vigor, dhyana), and when that apposition is characterized in art, Prajnaparamita (personified) is female, the other 5 are 'direction' buddhas. It's interesting to hear your discussion of the sutra because I've always heard it presented as an expression of the ineffability of enlightenment.
Sure, that sounds like a typically Zen way to interpret it!
No matter how much I listen to Mahayana folks talk about their path, they just don't make sense to me, and I really get the impression that they also don't understand it. I know the focus is to stop thinking about it and just start meditating, but honestly the incomprehensibility is sort of a turn off to me. I've been following the Theravada tradition for a few years and it make so much sense to me. I understand why I must meditate and what the goal is and it motivates me to be diligent. But, what ever path is chosen, I wish everyone peace, happiness and freedom from suffering.
Right, there are many paths for many different folks. Good to have a passing knowledge of each, but also good to find one that resonates with you personally.
Thanks for another great video, I was actually searching through your channel last week looking for this exact topic and was surprised it wasn't covered, and perfect timing here it is!
I aim to please! 😄😄
Thank you for this video, I am a lay zen Buddhism practitioner and find early Buddhism perspectives interesting and enriching ( and very different :) . As I am not a scholar ( or a Buddha) , please forgive my ignorance , but the heart sutra is very central in zen . The way we learn it , the sutra is a perfect example of zazen practice ( sitting meditation) when we sit and experience the interconnection of all things, each manifestation of the big mind ( the universe basically) has a form which is only a manifestation of the total function of causality , in that sense - emptiness is form and form is emptiness. The 5 scandas are like this as well , they exist, but they too are formations of one interconnected universe which is fundamentally one. While zen might be somewhat remote from early Buddhism practice, I think it might be an interesting reference to consider. 🙏
Yes these ideas of "big mind" and an interconnected universe are background ideas stemming from other sutras and other early schools of Buddhism that have found their way into Zen interpretations of the Heart Sutra. For more on interconnection see my video on Indra's Net: ua-cam.com/video/CQN7sVmckso/v-deo.html
Just picked up a nice first edition of Red Pines translation last week. On a past trip to Japan, I bought a mala bracelet at one of the Temples around Mt.Takao that had the heart sutra engraved on it among all the beads.
Nice one, Doug !
Many thanks!
Thank you Doug
Thanks Doug for thorough elaboration !
My pleasure!
Nice to have an easy one for a change:
When it says: “Therefore, Shariputra, in emptiness there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no memory and no consciousness; …”
It means that in the enlightened state (in emptiness), all of these things go away (out of awareness), and not to carry them with you (any more than you would carry around the raft you took to reach the other shore).
Where it gets tricky is how these terms would be considered in the enlightened state? Perhaps you could say that they are transformed: from form into no-form, …, as mind changes into no-mind (mushin), and thought to no-thought (wu-nien).
Thanks for this. I suppose I will need to rewatch some parts of this to understand what you want to express (please see this as a compliment).
Thank you, Doug. Already looking forward to the "sequel"... 🐱🙏
🙏 Namo Buddhaya 🙏 Obseisance to the Fully Awakened One
I love the Heart Sutta. Also, I love Doug('s videos).
Is that Thay’s calligraphy in the background? Loved it! Thank you for your wonderful and informative sharing on the Heart Sutra too 🙏🏼
Yes it is! 😄
Thank you so much for making this, been waiting for a video on this since I discovered your channel 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻 thank you for all your hard work
Very good discussion
Gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha!
The heart sutra can never be an interlectual exercise. It is a sudden all encompassing awakening to the nature of this moment.
very cool Doug
All of the teachings we learn from the Buddha including the four Noble Truths and Eightfold path is to be free of attachment, In Nibanna any attachment to anything experienced or of the impermanent words is empty of any meaning. The only way for one to ends suffering is to no longer crave the need to exist and free oneself of worldly attachments and free of all Samsara experience in all forms. All beings in Samsara including Deva are Suffering from the endless need to permanently exist in an impermanent world.
Thanks for the video, dear Doug.
Have you read the interpretation that Jayarava has proposed for the text?
His views seem very heterodox compared to what I've read in most sources. However, in my not-at-all-expert opinion, his ideas seem highly reasonable enough and worthy of consideration.
Kind regards!
I just posted a similar comment... hoping that Doug sees them.
Yes he has a number of interesting opinions on the text, but I can't get into everything. Consider my videos introductions!
At first glance, the message in this short sutra may be somewhat self-contradicting and confusing. However, the sutra indeed encapsulates the very essence of “emptiness” and the practice of Middle Way.
To make it a little easier to comprehend the message in this sutra, it will be quite helpful for the time being to imagine “Emptiness” being an empty space. Whatever put into that empty space transforms that empty space into itself as far as human eyes are concerned. We often see only what occupies the space and completely ignore the space itself. That is, in our perception, the empty space has become whatever object is put there. Thus “form is emptiness, emptiness is form”, and the same applies to the other four skandhas.
However, everything in the world is temporary. The space was empty to begin with, and whatever placed in that space will eventually deteriorate and transform into something else and disperse away from that space, leaving that space behind and that space becomes empty again. Thus, “in emptiness there is no form, no sensation, no perception, no memory and no consciousness, … , no attainment and no non-attainment.”
This does not mean that “emptiness” is equivalent to an “empty space”. Emptiness is merely a nature, not anything we can see or feel. The statement “in emptiness, there is no form, …”, further states that in essence, everything is nothing to begin with. Yet we constantly create things and concepts to serve some purpose(s). In fact, without purpose, nothing exists in the human sense. This doesn’t mean there is no existence, human simply transforms whatever exist into what they want them to be for some purposes. All purposes are self-serving, thus creating conflicts among all living beings when different purposes within a population or between populations do not agree with each other, resulting in negative karma and endless sufferings. Thus, “without attainment, bodhisattvas take refuge in Prajnaparamita and live without walls of the mind ….”
I believe the mantra connected with the teachings of Prajnaparamita teachings is to be seen as an encapsulation or essential condensation of the entire teachings. It works as a kind of a key which opens the doors to the wisdom of Prajnaparamita. It is the essential nature of all phenomena encapsulated within a few words that functions as a formula for the direct experience of the Prajnaparamita nature of reality. It can also be seen as a kind of seal that keeps all wisdom within it.
We can also approach this mantra as a form of bridge between the world of spoken teachings into the realms of direct experience. Just like the use of other forms of mantras it contains the power to bring forth the direct experience of the Prajnaparamita reality beyond the horizons of mere intellectual understanding and into the immediate realisation which doesn’t really on words or the thinking capacities of the mind any longer. In a way, a mantra is an instrument of immediacy rather than progression. This particular mantra is regarded as a heart mantra because of its direct connection with the Prajnaparamita wisdom which, in essence, teaches us about the true nature not being a product of a progressive path but rather the true nature itself, which is never separate from our experiences. Always present. Never separated from our reality. For that reason the mantra of Prajnaparamita is a supreme mantra of purification since it carries no stains of provisionality to it. It cannot be separated from true nature itself and is therefor both the means and the end towards the realisation of Prajnaparamita wisdom. It is both the bridge over and the final destination since Prajnaparamita is not a gradual path but truth itself.
If you beleive in short magical formula that enlightens you quickly, you will stay in this samsara for loong long time.
Discuss on kevatta(fisherman)sutta we were prominent buddhist in ancient India but hinduism(brahmin) made us their caste system slave which is "sc" category in mordern India, they forced to forget our history forget and I'm happy to see channel subscribers growing
I personally see the Heart Sutra being influenced by Nagarjuna's Madhyamaka and his explanation of Sunyata
It certainly could have been.
It is the nature of unenlightened person to try to cling to something. In the Buddha's day, it was the Self (atta/ atman). So Buddha claimed that those things are not self (anatta/ anatman).
Later on a question arise: if there is no self, who inherit karma in reincarnation? A sect try to answer this by saying that there is no self, but there is an individual (puggala). They got the name Puggalavada. These got rejected later because people then cling to this concept of puggala as new Self.
Later there is Abhidharma movement that systemize Buddha's teaching by classifying all phenomena (dharma) in the world. When defining a phenomena, an idea arise that there is intrinsic nature (svabhava) in each phenomena. Fire is hot, water is wet, this is timeless truth. This has appeal because suffering and its end and the path to end suffering - are also timeless phenomena.
Then came the idea that timeless truth must be The TRUTH (DHARMA), and so that must exist in some way. And there is also wordplay here, svabhava can also mean "own being/ self existence". And so a phenomena (dharma) that has intrinsic nature (svabhava) of timeless truth (dharma) must have intrinsic existence (svabhava).
Not surprising that people could get entangled and cling to these self existent phenomena as new object of attachment. And so Prajnaparamita aim to unravel this new attachments. By saying "Svabhava-sunya" - empty of svabhava.
This new claim can also be new object of attachment. And so Nagarjuna said "sunyata-sunyata" = the emptiness of emptiness. Don't try to replace reality with concept of emptiness, that's just another delusion.
So how do you go about anything in any meaningful way then ?
@miguelatkinson the buddha nature.
@miguelatkinson do it while not being attached to anything. Buddha said "there's nothing worth clinging"
Thank you for this exploration of the Heart Sutra, Doug. Having all the background material is very helpful. Like you mentioned, this sutta tends to stimulate the intellect. My view is that this sutra can only be fully understood from a phenomenological point of view. The first result as it appears in section III, is what Thomas Metzinger has called a “minimal phenomenal experience”(MPE). In these episodes of “pure consciousness” there are no perceptions. Only “vast emptiness”.
Could the Heart Sutra be an attempt to direct the practitioner to the direct experience of this?
Sure, that's one possible interpretation.
I always assumed that its negation of traditional Buddhist conceptual formulations was less a sectarian conflict and more an admonition against intellectualism eclipsing direct personal experience of the path and its consequences. I just assumed a sort of paradoxical complementarity, typical of zen.
Well I think it's both ... I'll get into a bit more of this in my next video.
Emptiness is form, form is emptiness. As above, so below. Emptiness arises with form for form cannot exist without empitness and vise versa. They are 2 sides of the same coin.
Hi Doug! Great video 👍👍👍👍 I don't know if you have answered this question before; What are those books behind you. I would really like to know :)
Yes those are translations of the Pāli suttas, published by Wisdom.
My funeral will just have the chanting of the Heart Sutra. Science via quantum physics explains the Heart Sutra, we are empty of a separate self
@Samana-Recluse it takes one, to know one
💙
Lovely video and interesting questions. Is it not the prasangika method of investigation reliant on refutation and not affirmation. On that basis, it can be understood why there is there no such affirmation followed by negation. Such as there is emptiness but no self existent impermanence. Even the briefest of affirmations would posit true existence which would be impossible from the get go.
That's right, as I understand it, from a prasangika standpoint.
For people who practice and follow the Dharma, the Heart Sutra doesn’t actually offer much. First reach Nirvana, then you’ll see that there are no more questions. The fact that people think that they can become like The Buddha after nirvana through personal “will”, have lost the way. After nirvana, things happen. You don’t “do” much. What happens will be an ocean of kindness, from our perspective. That is just the natural way of the world, without ignorance, beyond suffering. Over philosophising is not the way. Remain steadfast in your practice. Namo Buddhaya 🙏
Great video considering the enigma and challenges in explaining the Heart Sutra. But have to say more than a little disappointed that there was no mention of the current scholars who have published valuable work on or pertaining to the the Heart Sutra e.g. Attwood, Huifeng/Orsborn and Nattier.
Why are they continued to be ignored by the mainstream academia?
❤
There is so much work on the Heart Sutra that it is impossible to include it all, or even a representative sample, in a short video like this. You would need a dissertation.
Make a vidoe too on diamond sutra
Sir one more question Will the world ever end or not
I have a question are we alone in this universe is there another planet like Earth what did buddha say on this
Why is that important? If there are indeed such beings but they don't or can't interact with us, then how is that different from non-existent
Lotus Sutra next! 😂
I discussed the Lotus Sutra a bit in my videos on skillful means.
When a being discovers they are nothing of impermanence only experiencing impermanence they discover that nothing they gained from impermanence belongs to the empty formless being. Beginning at Birth a Being takes a form, the Being existing before form being taken. The form cannot exist without the Being, the Being existing without form.
Everything taken is something never belonging to the empty formless self and everything only exists if a being takes it. Nothing impermanent belongs to any being that isn’t impermanant.
The state of Nibanna is to no longer attach and crave including form or the need to exist and experience Samsara
Somehow, the theory of relativity of Einstein is correlated to the teachings of Buddhism. Matter and energy is exchangeable and forever indestructible. There is no inconsistency in this sutra.
I don't think the statements "X is emptiness and emptiness is X" are supposed to "mean" something. It says that everything is empty (lacking svabhava), and thus no concept can make sense. Also kamma is empty, and dhamma, too.
That's why nibbana = samsara without ignorance. So as far as you have samsara, there is dukkha. You will have dukkha always as far as there is co-arisen things, and not wanting to change that is nibbana.
The passage "there is no change etc." just means: change is defined by humans, the path is defined by humans etc., they do not exist inherently. That's why the diamond sutta says "the Buddhadhamma is not perfect, and thus it's perfect" (roughly). It does never say that change is impossible. It's just that you can say "A is ehhwbsbhf7en" and then say "A changed to fhejjwifjbe". Both are made up.
At least those are my interpretations of course.
That's the unique thing about buddhism. It speaks rather dynamically.
Nibbana is not samsara without ignorance. Yogacara philosophy is erroneous when it states that, samsaric life is dukkha and even the Lord Buddha still faced immense dukkha even after perfect bodhi. Change happens regardless, a human need not be present for it to happen because all conditioned things are marked by anicca, dukkha, anatta. Diamond Sutra gets this wrong because it states how all phenomena is mind created, while the Lord Buddha specifically said that mind is created from dhammas and not dhammas created from mind. If change were defined by humans then we would all wish to never change into an old person, yet our kamma dictates otherwise. I hope you can see the compassion in my words and I hope you find peace and grow in happiness 🙏
Why did the author choose Avalokiteshvara as the narrator?
Bodhisattva of compassion?
@DougsDharma Right. I would have expected Manjusri for such a wisdom-oriented text.
@@be1tube it is indeed a curiosity. Other Prajnaparamita sutra has The Buddha himself as narrator, or Manjusri. As far as I remember, this is the only Prajnaparamita sutra with Avalokitesvara as narrator.
There is that theory about Heart Sutra was composed in China, as summary recitation from larger Prajnaparamita sutra - translation by Kumarajiva.
Maybe the chinese monk who composed it was a worshipper of Avalokitesvara.
I like the heart sutra. In my opinion, from a scientific viewpoint there is no truly "self". Because looking deeply atom (carbon, oxygen, nitrogen,..) are "floating around" like lego building cells that becomes us. I agree with the word "Interbeing" from plumvillage.
I personally think not to take avalokiteshwara too serious as a real person but more philosophical : "deep understanding" which is the teacher of awakening or Buddha and both is found in ones heart. The other sore is a place that ones is truly free. We don't need to practice in order to get the result in the future.
"The real meaning of the word 'birth' as the Buddha meant it is not the birth from a mother's womb, that's too physical. The birth that the Buddha was pointing to was spiritual, the birth of clinging to 'I' and 'mine'. In one day there can be hundreds of births; the amount depends on a person's capacity, but in each birth the 'I' and 'mine' arises, slowly fades, and gradually disappears and dies. Shortly, on contact with a sense-object, another arises. Each birth generates a reaction that carries over to the next. This is what is called the kamma of a previous life ripening in the present birth. It is then transmitted further. Every birth is like this."
-Buddhadasa
By the way... I respect other options. One beautiful story I would like to share. "After a fload in Chiang Mai a group monks and novice from Theravada temple helped to clean up Mahayana temple peacefully .
An atom is a form, but an atom itself is made out of emptiness (99.99999999999999% empty, while proton and neutron is not a form but tornado like energy - the make up of proton and neutron, while electron is a point like with no form). So in emptiness (the true nature of an atom) has no form but through emptiness a concept of form appears (like an atom).
There is no language/words to describe emptiness bcuz it's meant to be experienced. The attachment to words/anything usually restricts our understanding of Dhamma. Nihilism/nothingness is an attachment to the word empty which is dangerous, while the attachment to form will produce materialism. Words/ideology/faith if not fully understood will become attachments.
Personal perspective is important. It is what everything boils down to. The texts and writings only provide a generalized idea. These are also limited by what human language can attempt to describe. Personalized experiences complete it.
This makes the most sense to me
To piggy back off my first comment as well, another misunderstanding is the question everyone struggles with "If there is no self, then what is reborn?"
The Buddha never taught that there wasn't no self. He taught what you believe to be self is actually a temporary self of aggregates.
So what is reborn is another temporary self of aggregates.
The question is null, because it starts off with a lie. It claims the Buddha never taught about self. Buddha did teach about self. He said it's five aggregates, and he taught it continues to be reborn through karma.
What will be reborn is another temporary, impermanent self made up of aggregates, just like the one you have now, ad infinitum until realization of emptiness ( Nirvana)
Namo Buddha 🙏
Yes as to that question, I did a video on it awhile back: ua-cam.com/video/xjlBobj0iSA/v-deo.html
A Dharma being irreducible does not take away its emptiness. Emptiness simply means it is dependently originated. That doesn't steal away that Matter is irreducible. Matter is dependently originated/empty, and also irreducible.
It is a subtle misunderstanding to say that something has self nature, and that it exists as "alone by itself".
The khandas are irreducible, yes, and also they are empty. Emptiness is not taking a chair in the room and breaking it down to its atoms to reduce it to its most irreducible component of the four elements which are indeed self nature and irreducible. Rather, Emptiness is taking the chair in the room and seeing it's caused and conditioned by everything before it. Without the rain, the chair could not exist, since the tree needs rain, the chair needs tree for the wood. Emptiness is saying there is nothing that exists "seperately" from everything else, nothing has its own independent essence that is split from everything else, and here in where there is subtle confusing with that line of wording where people read "self nature" as not being empty, no that's not the case.
The khandas are irreducible, upon analyzing reality you cannot go break sankharas like "thought, down further. Thought, is just thought. So it has self nature because it is irreducible, but it is still Anatta/emptiness/dependently originated (all synonymous) because it does not have self nature"seperate" that exists in its own. Thought is conditioned. Rocks don't have thought, they don't have the causes and conditions to have thought. If I put you under anesthesia, you don't have thought.
Hope this is helpful. Wonderful video as usual Doug thanks 🙏
Can you provide an academic source to me that states an early school using the heart sutra as a rebuttal to sarvastivadins abhidhamma?
I believe the Perfection of Wisdom literature generally is understood as a rebuttal to the Sarvāstivādin Abhidharma.
These scholars may have taken it as a refutation of the core teachings of Buddhism, but I take it as a reinforcement of the core teachings of Buddhism as they are all interconnected theorems based on linear lines of logic. Therefore the talk about a “higher path” to a “higher” and more “eternal” enlightenment without direct experience is just conjecture and idle/wishful thinking spurned by the ego’s desires. Let’s just say hypothetically that there was a so-called higher stage. What good is it if you can’t even attain a lower stage to begin with? The Buddha has claimed to achieve the highest state of being free of suffering forever and taught the methods of achieving that goal. Is that simply not good enough? What more could you want?
The Buddha never said any of this and Avalokiteshvara is not a real human. These are ACTUAL Facts. Please recognize. None of this is authentic. It was created by the Chinese who later translated it to Sanskrit. It is nothing but Mahayana propaganda to put down early (Theravada) Buddhism.
The Source Material is Very important and with this Sutra, it's just not credible.
BTW I am a Zen practitioner of over 30 years and have recited this thousands of times in my life.
Table is form, but there’s no such thing called as a table. Tables are made of atoms, and atoms are vibrations…
Form is emptiness, emptiness is form. So is the self, the table, the mind, etc…
…
The Buddha in Tipitaka against nihilism and eternalism …
If no self meaning not existence self = nihilism.. if self is in existence , then it’s eternalism..
So, it’s true that form is emptiness, emptiness is form.
J Krishnamurti made the whole of the complex and obscure Buddhist doctrine and practices irrelevant , that is unless you are attached to Buddhism and can't let it go.
@@snowflakemelter1172 lol
prajnaparamita = present awaresness? gone gone supergone ultrasupergone awakening so be?
Prajñāpāramitā literally means perfection (pāramitā) of wisdom (prajñā).
@ knew that. my source is SELF LIBERATION THROUGH SEEING WITH NAKED AWARENESS by padmasambhava (pdf)
0:21 “It covers more of the Buddha’s teachings than any other scripture”
That is false. In fact, the Buddha is not even present in the Prajnaparamita Sutra. The Prajnaparamita Sutra is a dialogue between Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva and Sariputra. Shakyamuni Buddha is not present at all. It is Avalokiteshvara’s teachings, not Shakyamuni Buddha.
It’s not false. The sutra itself states that Avalokiteshvara spoke by the power of the Buddha who was present in the gathering, and to applauded his explanation to Sariputra.
Be it real or false, the text praises the Buddha's teaching and encourages detachment from the 5 sensory illusion.
Yes, this is an interesting claim. I'll touch on it a bit in my next video. 😊
@@ALIEN_857 The Lord Buddha never said they were illusory, nowhere in the Pali Suttas does he claim that. If he did then it would not be in conjunction with dependent origination
@@ewkeenan The name Avalokiteshvara is no where found in the Pali Suttas, nor does any amount of what is meant in the Heart Sutra found in the Pali Suttas as well
Nothing to see here, move along...
The most famous Buddhist scripture is maybe the Kama Sutra. There have been films, videos, books, coloring books... in all possible languages, not that there's a lot of talking anyway.
I don't think kama which means sexual activity was truly promoted in Buddhism.
Kama Sutra? There is a Kama Sutta in the Pali Tradition in which the Buddha speaks on the harm of sensual pleasure. The Kama Sutra, that is the famous sexual text which goes over sexual positions and poses, is not a Buddhist text. Many will say it’s a Hindu text but this is not true either as it doesn’t conform to any of the teachings in the Vedas, including the Upanishads as well as other foundational texts like the Bhagavad Gita or Srimad Bhagavatam. Otherwise, it would not be encouraging lust and sexual pleasure. Therefore, it would not apply to Buddhist teaching or Hindu teaching.