Nagarjuna's Bodhichitta Commentary; 05-October-2007 (Day 5 of 5) - Dalai Lama Audio Teachings on Tibetan Buddhism Podcast

Some Madhyamikas, such as Kamalashila�s teacher, the great abbot Shantarakshita, accept the Cittamatrin presentation of the lack of external phenomena. However, they further assert that the mind also lacks true existence and shares the deceptive, illusion-like qualities of externalities. His Holiness explains the importance of the post-meditation practice of viewing all phenomena in daily life as illusion-like and how this practice will increase positive mental qualities such as compassion and bodhicitta while simultaneously decreasing the perceptions of independent existence (the grasping mind that generates afflictive emotions), and how to use this wisdom to complement the method practices of generosity, etc. His Holiness discusses using the method path to complement meditations on emptiness; the short term benefits of bodhicitta practice; clairvoyance; the long-term project of gradually purifying and ripening through sustained effort. He explains the five Bodhisattva paths in relation to the Heart Sutra dharani (gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi). Turning to the Nagarjuna text, His Holiness discusses the highest school of Buddhist tenets, the Madhaymika Prasangika (Middle Way Consequentialist), and how the two extremes of nihilism and reification are avoided by seeing that �dependent origination is the meaning of emptiness.� He explains that the Prasangika assertion that everything exists by mere imputation in dependence upon a basis of designation does not mean that everything merely imputed is existent, and he discusses the fallacies of a view known as �other emptiness. Finally, His Holiness reviews stanzas 72-84 of Nagarjuna’s Commentary on Bodhicitta as a preliminary to the ceremony for conferring the aspirational Bodhisattva vows.