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HEART SUTRA INTENSIVE
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four
This is a transcription of one of ShantiMayi’s Intensives on the Heart Sutra. Each and every Intensive is different, even if the topic is the same. We hope that you gain a new insight that offers True Wisdom to what you have come to understand about the essential reality of existence. That Wisdom is seated within the hearts of all
Part one
Notes are numbered, example= (1. ) and listed at the end of each transcription
Day one (click here for day two)
Three day Intensive with ShantiMayi, India, January 1999.
1 HEART OF PERFECT WISDOM SUTRA
2 Om, homage to the blissful Holy Perfect Wisdom!
3 Avalokiteshvara, Holy Bodhisattva, moving in deep wisdom
4 Saw below the five heaps: these he saw in essence empty
5 Here O Shariputra form is emptiness, the very emptiness is form;
6 Not separate from form is emptiness, not separate from emptiness is form
7 What is form that is emptiness; what is emptiness is form
8 Like this are feelings, thoughts, impressions, understandings
9 Here O Shariputra all phenomena are marked with emptiness and
10 Not created, not destroyed, not impure, not pure, not deficient, not complete
11 O Shariputra therefore in the emptiness is no form
12 And no feeling, thought, impression, understanding
13 And no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind
14 No form, sound, smell, taste, touch or thought
15 No element of eyes and so forth to no-mind conscious element
16 No ignorance, no end of ignorance, and so forth to
17 No old age and no death, no end of old age or of death
18 No sorrow, cause or end, no path; no knowing, no attachment and nonattachment
19 Thus O Shariputra, with this nonattainment does Bodhisattva
20 On the Perfect Wisdom place reliance, thus removing thought obstruction,
21 With no thought obstruction is no fear beyond all error,
22 He is certain of Nirvana
23 Buddhas of the three times all
24 Awaken to the highest, perfect and complete enlightenment relying on the Perfect Wisdom.
25 Therefore we should know the Perfect Wisdom, the Great Mantra
26 Great bright magic mantra, highest mantra and unequalled mantra
27 Cure of every sorrow, true because not false.
28 In Perfect Wisdom is the mantra spoken:
29 GATE GATE PARAGATE PARASAMGATE BOHDI SVAHA
SM:This is the Heart Sutra, not very long, but very deep.
You almost might wonder why it is called ‘Heart Sutra’ since there is no mention of love, and
definitely this sutra is devoid of emotion. There is not even any concern with unconditional love here.
We will take it now from the first sentence, which is ‘Heart of Perfect Wisdom Sutra.’ It is not only the
title but also the first sentence. We will go all the way to the tenth sentence in the first day of the intensive.
Avalokiteshvara, Holy Bodhisattva, moving in deep wisdom
saw below the five heaps: these he saw in essence empty
SM:Do you know what the five heaps are? ( 1.)They are the ‘skhandas’. I like reading sutras a lot myself, they are very revealing, very detailed, excitingly precise and well delivered wisdom.
He saw the five heaps empty. Avalokiteshvara is the great bodhisattva of compassion. Heaps are not the five senses, because there are more then five senses. Five senses also branch off into many more categories. The five heaps are the five skhandas. Five skhandas are: consciousness, form, feeling, perception and mental formations; that is a ‘person’, these skandas make up a person. Now the Boddhisattwa says they are empty.
What is ‘emptiness’? What is the sutra talking about when it says that all of these points, these very important things, consciousness, everything within and the whole of existence are empty, essentially? Form is empty essentially. You see the five senses are coming under this domain. Feelings are empty, empty, empty essentially. Perceptions are empty essentially and mental formations are empty essentially.
What does it mean?
Now it is your turn. You have looked at the sutra. What does it mean to you? What have you found?
What have you seen from inside of your heart; not at all a philosophical way of looking, but
from within your understanding, what have you found? What have you understood?
Student: Ultimately there is only awareness.
SM:Ultimately there is only awareness and what is that? What is it really? What do you see it as?
Student: It comes and goes.
SM: In awareness nothing comes and goes. Here comes the axe! Only in consciousness things come and go and the great Avalokiteshvara is saying that, as he was moving in Perfect Wisdom. Avalokiteshvara is neither man nor a woman, the Great Bodhisattva; sometimes seen as a woman and sometimes seen as a man.
Student: Empty means there is no intrinsic reality in it.
SM: Yes, empty means there is no intrinsic reality in it. What does that mean?
Student: It is impermanent.
SM: Yes, it is impermanent. Consciousness is not permanent. Feelings are not permanent. Thought constructs are not permanent. Form is not permanent. Then why if you know it so well do you continue to act as though it is not so?
Student: It is our conditioning.
SM: It is about time we get over our conditioning. We have been un-conditioning now for twenty years,
upon life-times and eons.
Student: The one who acts is as empty as that which he is acting upon.
SM: Well, this is an interesting thing. That is so. You know it is so.
Why is there any identification at all and why do you not completely surrender to that Noble Wisdom and completely realize your true nature in the same moment?
Student: Because we don’t see the emptiness. We do not reside in it consciously.
SM: Yes, that is really a good point. We do not reside in it consciously; means take our seat and move and be whatever we are. Then again we have this fear of emptiness. Why do we have a fear of emptiness?
Why don’t we fear imagination?
Student: Fear is not of emptiness, fear is what we think of emptiness.
SM: This is wonderful. Fear is what we think of emptiness.
Student: What do we have to give up for it.
SM: What does the Great Sutra say? Whatever makes up the human being is itself empty.
There is another definition of emptiness that is so wonderful. I think it is a wonderful definition; emptiness itself means: ‘devoid of ignorance’. Would it make it easier for you to enter emptiness wisdom, knowing
that it is simply devoid of ignorance? Yes, I think it would. It is strange that it would, but it would. Somehow, it satisfies you because you don’t want to be filled with ignorance, but you don’t want to be filled with emptiness either.
Yet it is so. What happens is that you begin to imagine what emptiness is, and as the Great Bodhisattva
noticed, whatever laid in those heaps: feelings and perceptions and mental formations; they are also empty.
What a magic sutra, what a magic mantra. When you see it for what it is, you cannot even imagine that it can harm you. You cannot even imagine your fear, you cannot imagine your desires, and you cannot imagine your limitations. It is impossible because everywhere you look, even the looker him -or herself is emptiness, free, simple, clear. What have we said about unconditional love in the past? What is it really?
It is neutrality. That neutrality is like opening up the sky after being in a cave, locked inside for centuries.
When you are full of feelings and you are full of emotions and you are full of your thought made limitations you can remember the ‘Heart Sutra’.
‘Heart Sutra’, because it comes right from the center of Divine Wisdom - of Noble Wisdom.
Let’s go on now and see what else the sutra says.
Do you have any questions or any points on the sutra?
Student: The sutra starts more or less with the mentioning of the name of Avalokiteshvara.
It seems like there is a tremendous hint. It is stating that ‘form is empty’ from His/Her realization,
the Buddha of compassion. As if this can only been seen if you are submerged in compassion.
SM: It is exactly. He says it can only been seen if you are submerged in compassion, in resonance: in resonance with yourself and in resonance with the whole of the universe.
It starts out with that exactly. Everything in Buddha’s Sutras (of such intensity, of such precision) always, every word unfolds a story. Every word, every sentence. The structure of the sentence, the way it is, everything gives way to understanding. The Buddha’s Sutras are all like that. All of the Mahayana scriptures and the great sutra’s are like that.
Never bother to think: "I am too mature to read", if you feel like reading.
If you don’t feel like reading it is one thing, but sometimes I hear amongst the disciples and the students of "Gyan: " Oh, do away with it." But I think Osho said he read something like five thousand books, more.
Because he liked to do it, not because he had to do it.
You don’t read to learn, you read for companionship. You read to un-learn. You read for resonance.
You study the sutras because they remind you: "Yes, yes, oh yes. Nobody has said it like that, yes, yes! Yum, yum…where are you, from whose lips and heart does this drop in my heart’s vessel? I love to hear it like this; my God!" Sometimes I am like that when I hear something so delicious. Who can speak like this to me!
Only the sage and the sutra can speak to me like this. To me, in me, for me and to touch me so deeply.
My Guru can touch me so deep but never does he speak to me like this, but because he has poured his Grace on me I can hear it in the sutra. I feel it is like that; I always felt it is like that. Ok, back to the Heart Sutra.
Avalokiteshvara, the holy Bodhisattva, moving in deep Perfect Wisdom, only he could see it from "here". Later on in the fifth sentence he also says: "Here, O Shariputra;" here, not where. From "here," this is your place; your place is emptiness now.
He is saying; when you are playing in the field of emptiness, acting as though you are identified and you are an individual and something is painful and something is glorious and something is this and something is that and there is trouble, here and there. Life is stirring. He says not from there you can see this; no, from HERE.
Only from the point of emptiness can one see, only from the point of Noble Wisdom and this IS Noble Wisdom, to "see" the emptiness, eyes closed or open. Empty of what? Read the third chapter of the Lankavatara Sutra. Empty of opinions, of concept, of quality, of need, of separate-ness or oneness, or even of emptiness, but understand it well. It is the material of Adepts and it is the unwoven fabric of your being.
Empty of what you want "it" to be, this is truly empty. Empty of what you think "it" is, is also genuinely empty. What you expect out of "it", well, that is an empty expectation. We can use the word emptiness in so many ways. One of the most famous parts of the Heart Sutra is sentences number six and seven:
Not separate from form is emptiness, not separate from emptiness is form
What is form that is emptiness; what is emptiness is form
‘Not separate from form is emptiness’. Why do we get our heart broken if we hear such a thing?
There is a poem by Lareshwari and such a wonderful poem it is and it says:
Loosen the load of sweetness I am carrying.
The sling knot is biting into my shoulder.
This day has been so meaningless.
I feel I can’t go on.
When I was with my Master I heard a truth,
that hurt my heart like a blister.
The tender pain of seeing something
that I loved as an illusion.
The flocks I tended are gone.
I am a shepherd without even a memory
as to what that means
Climbing this mountain, I feel so lost.
This was my inward way, until I came unto
the presence of the moon.
This new wisdom of how like-nesses unite
Good friend, everything is You, I see only God.
Now the delightful forms and motions
are transparent.
I look through them.
And see myself as the Absolute.
And here’s the answer to the riddle of the dream:
You leave;
so we two can do ONE dance.
So she has this feeling that she has really lost something. But in just a little turn, she has realized: no, in fact she has not lost anything. Her eyes have now been transformed and she can see God in everything.
Through that, the eyes get transformed. Through that little blister in the heart, she sees that it is really and truly empty. Aren’t blisters empty? Somehow it doesn’t feel good, but just in a moment, everything is understood with perfect clarity. What can you lose in emptiness? Emptiness is the very possibility in life.
I am making this sutra intensive because the next intensive for the ‘Lankavatara’ is so severe; it cuts your throat. The Lankavatara Sutra examines words. It takes the tongue and pulls it right out. It takes the ears and makes them completely hollow. It is like just being a skeleton; that is all.
"Here oh Shariputra", Grace starts flowing, revealing that emptiness is harmless, that emptiness is fearless, and emptiness is true in all. Emptiness is borderless. Emptiness is devoid of ignorance. Emptiness is clear and it leaves life’s play the same as before, actually. Nothing is gained and nothing is lost; only your foolishness is lost. It cannot be so painful. Shall I say it again? Only your foolishness is lost. It cannot be so painful.
Come along now!
Not separate from form is emptiness, not separate from form, not separate from anything you see, that you feel, that you experience; is that empty Perfect Wisdom. Not separate, not for a minute. Empty, devoid of ignorance.
Absolutely pure. Absolutely pristine and clear and these words, well they hardly even send off an arrow.
How is it that we can think, that we get the idea that is always in our heart, in our mind, in our daily life. We must merge with God; the experience, the life, the existence called God, the total essence of every being, every experience? Where do we get such notions? Not for a second, it cannot be. That empty pristine clarity is always, the sutra says and I too say. Now you say! And understand ! And realize! You think the sutra is right? Is the sutra correct? How come you think the sutra is correct today and not tomorrow and not yesterday? Why don’t you think the sutra is perfectly and accurately right every second of every day?
Better than thinking it: realize the Perfect Wisdom, rely only on that Noble Wisdom. Don’t let it go.
If you have to cling, only cling to the Perfect Wisdom. If you have to be attached, be attached only to the Perfect Wisdom. If you have to have a desire, only desire the Perfect Wisdom and it will display everything to you. It will show you everything from the inside of your heart. There is no doubt about it, absolutely no doubt about it!
Student: Isn’t it true that sometimes the emptiness is better expressed by form, than by emptiness itself ?
For example, when I listen to some music I hear total silence, more silence than music.
SM: It is a good point. There is not any sound whatsoever that can disturb the silence. The silence is never disturbed by anything and this is why the sutra says so clearly; consider this, consider it so much that you cannot ignore it anymore. You must pierce through the limitation, to realize the boundlessness.
It is like that. Sometimes we get it in our minds that: " Oh, I have to be off in the distance somewhere all by myself". It’s a good idea, but you must not be limited to that notion. The boundless is also in your daily life, at the university, at your work, in your families. It is a very good point. You must realize this Noble Wisdom. Emptiness is in the one that stands in front of you, in the one you love so much, in the one that irritates you totally.
You fall or rise, either way. You fall or rise, no matter what direction you go, in, out, up or down, because whether you fall, rise or roll over, there is what? There or "Here oh Shariputra", is Noble Wisdom, is emptiness, is pristine awareness. awareness, we have to be ever so careful because it is the only thing we can say: that "this" is totally non-dual and un-experiential. Our true nature is not consciousness, as all the books say.
Consciousness is our experience, that is how it is experienced, but that is not our true nature.
Consciousness is the nature of existence but that is not our true nature. Why? Consciousness is not the true nature of anything except for the perception. Why? Perception is pervaded by consciousness. Both are empty and are not entities. You can only perceive if you are conscious, even conscious in sleep.
Conscious means what?
Student: To be aware.
S.M.: No! Conscious does not mean to be aware. You may be conscious and unaware. Ask the doctors in the emergency room. You are even conscious in deep sleep, though you are not perceiving. That you can remember that you did not perceive in deep sleep, is enough to be conscious. Reference, perception, memory, cognition or the ability to access any of these qualities before or after the fact, that may be called consciousness in the book of ShantiMayi. Conscious: ‘con’ means two. ‘cious-ness’ means knowledge. It means two knows. Two or more knows. What is known is consciousness. Although the unknown may also be consciousness because knowing is a vast and subtle field of emptiness. Let’s just make it very simple. What is unknown may in some way also be called awareness. This is an overlapping subtlety in an undivided boundlessness. But whatever is awareness is not known. What is unknowable is awareness; "you" cannot know "it".
Student: It is just happening.
S.M.: No, it is not happening. What is " happening" is in awareness. Blue is in the ocean, the water is not blue. So, you can say nothing about awareness! In the same way that you cannot define water by the colour blue, even if it is ocean water that you are defining and even if it is blue.
You can say absolutely nothing about it, so forget it. I am a little softer than I was in the Lankavatara intensive, I am sorry. I like very much to be as fiery as a ball rolling out of heaven, burning up everything.
It just feels a little softer today; we see what happens tomorrow.
Note (1.) 5 Skhandas or heaps
Consciousness
Form
Feelings
Perception(s)
Mental Formations
© (1999-2007)