About this episode

Lama Zopa Rinpoche discusses the meaning of negation in the Heart Sutra and its implications for understanding phenomena and meditation.

This teaching was given by Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Lama Tsonkhapa Institute in Italy as part of the Ganden Lha Gyama retreat between September 3-30, 2004. 00:00:01 Rinpoche tells about the meaning of negation in the Heart Sutra. "No" doesn't mean that things do not exist, it is negating the way phenomena appear - as truly existent from their own side. Understanding this point helps not to fall into extremes of nihilism and eternalism. 00:10:05 How to avoid the mistake from the very beginning of your analysis by identifying the correct object of refutation - gak-cha. 00:33:00 Phenomena exist, but they exist in mere name, merely imputed by mind. They do not exist from their own side. 01:04:00 From the I down to the split seconds of consciousness, all phenomena exist in mere name, merely imputed by mind. Without mind labeling them, they cannot exist. 01:27:00 When meditating on emptiness, if fear arises, that is a good sign - it means your meditation is harming the object of ignorance, the root of samsara. One should go through the fear, not stop the meditation. 01:48:00 The word "Ah" in the Heart Sutra is like an atomic bomb that destroys the hallucination of true existence projected…

People in this episode

Host: Lama Zopa Rinpoche

Topics covered

• negation
• Heart Sutra
• emptiness
• meditation
• samsara
• buddhism

Keywords

• negation
• Heart Sutra
• emptiness
• meditation
• samsara
• nihilism
• eternalism

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Lama Tsonkhapa Institute

Books & works: Heart Sutra

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