HEART SUTRA INTENSIVE
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four

Part Four:

Here in part four, we end the commentary on the Heart of Wisdom Sutra.

This is one of the most important sutras of all sutras.
It is concise, compelling, insistent and intensely revealing.
Within the 29 lines that make up the Prajnaparamita Hyrdia Sutra (Heart of Perfect Wisdom Sutra), there is an abundant wealth of tacit wisdom, transparent precision. The very precision and transparency that dissolves searching altogether. The sutra is a diamond clear stream with thousands upon thousands of facets. Each facet presents, reflects, penetrates and reveals unusual beauty and wisdom. Turning the treasure in the clear light of willingness conveys silent meaning after silent meaning. The great bodhisattva emerges and teaches what the wise are yearning to acknowledge. To view this diamond once is a blessing. To consider its content is an initiation. To be drenched in one facet of its magnitude, opens the heart and mind forever. I feel honored to comment on this ineffable beauty called the Heart of Wisdom Sutra.
SM

Now let us begin with the end.
The Heart of Wisdom is the only reliance for one who shall realize the great enlightening splendor, an essential emptiness and the vast potential in life as it is.
As stated above, the Heart Sutra is a multi-faceted jewel.
It can be and has been interpreted many different ways. How we see the jewel shining in this moment is one way. How we see it in a different light is another way. All great teachings are without substance and without view. They take you into and through an entrance, past where you now stand. That is true for wherever you may stand. The better the teaching is, the further the entry into one's heart, and that is a ceaseless passage.
Lao Tzu's "Tao Te Ching" can teach a new arrival, and can light the continuing journey of the great and ancient sage, at once. This is also true in the light of the Heart of Wisdom Sutra.

 

We begin on line 18.
No sorrow, cause or end, no path; no knowing, no attachment and non-attachment.

To understand well relieves one of concern and of sorrow, and of seeking a cause or projecting an end. Sorrow passes as quickly as it will, when left to pass. Accept the experience; let it pass and reap the golden wisdom gem. This, is understanding, at its best. There is nothing superficial about it. It is a treasury of freedom, not an excuse to neglect responsibility, but the ability to respond clearly with wisdom and veracity.
Cause is un-origin-ated and un-isolate-able. Cause is beginningless as well as without end. Therefore, there is no one singular cause. For if there were a singular cause, there would be an endless succession of singular causes and no end to endless singular origins and therefore no singularity could ever be established as true. That is not possible, for where there is an apparent beginning, there is an apparent end in the same moment, ceaselessly. This is the illusion of actuality and action (karma) that turns the wheel of existence. Seeing or realizing this non-dwelling experience, then one humbly comes to realize the beginningless. Ends are actually beginnings as has already been stated. Also, there is no end, nor a circle. Simply, experience is non- dwelling.

You see, the most effective 'teachings' are fundamentally beginningless and endless, and the same always, throughout antiquity up to this very moment. Like Earth has remained our home no matter what empires or wildernesses have come and gone and again cover her surface. The Earth is and has always been 'fundamentally' the same earth. So too, the true matter of humanity and the wisdom of the heart. It is the same and has always been the same, without beginning and without end.

The sutra says 'no path' because the path and the dharma and the practice are all incomprehensible. Incomprehensible because for each his way is his own, in the way and along the way.
But each takes the 'teaching' into his or her heart as they do, in the manner that they can, and by their nature. It is like a potter with a lump of clay, the clay itself never changes. It is always earth and water. The fire that hardens clay is always fire. How the artist forms the clay is never the same twice. The fire that hardens the clay is never twice the same. The elements of life are like that. The elements of teaching and learning and wisdom are like that, ancient, fundamental and completely anew at once. The path is no path, lit by great and Noble Wisdom. The path is beneath everyone's feet at all times. So how can there be a path? Wherever you go and wherever you stand, emptiness is the foundation and the matrix of expression and experience. Therefore, all things and notions and experiences are empty of any substantial content what-so-ever and yet potent and undeniably phenomenal . Why? Because experience has no permanence or dwelling or root, no origin nor is there non-origin, being nor non being. Experience is unfounded and yet is experienced. The meaning of this grand understanding is realized and not 'known'. Wisdom is set-free of knowing when you realize that you don't know and that no one knows the unknowable. The wisdom of 'no knowing' is indeed wisdom at its finest, very, very finest. There, 'all is' wisdom, right there.
No attachment nor non-attachment.
Can the sky attach or be non-attached from space? Can emptiness attach to emptiness? Can the 'Truth' be non-attached from the 'Truth', which is fully all that is?
Include your self. When Buddha is attached to Buddha, that attachment is truly non-grasping.

19 Thus O Shariputra, with this non-attainment does a Bodhisattva

Non-attainment is the last and the least and the most that can be said for the awakening One.
It is central to great maturity and is not obvious before great maturity. Understanding is non-attainment.

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

Thought obstruction is removed by understanding impermanence. Impermanence is emptiness. Emptiness is possibility. In possibility one transcends fear instantly. Fear is empty and impermanent as are all experiences in existence. Every thought is empty, and emptiness is non-obstruction. The true nature of all things in existence is realized when impermanence is truly understood. Nirvana is the cessation of duality, so too is true understanding.

23 Buddhas of the three times all

Past / present / future.

24 Awaken to the highest, perfect and complete enlightenment relying on the Perfect Wisdom.
Nothing can be added or subtracted from 'This'.

25 Therefore we should know the Perfect Wisdom, the Great Mantra
Our spirituality (whatever that may mean, to whomever, so intimately personal) is a constant reminder of the 25^th line of the Heart Sutra. Let us know the Perfect Wisdom from within our hearts. Upon maturity the heart is one with our intellect. This is comparable to the alchemical marriage of the inseparable heart and mind.

26 Great bright magic mantra, highest mantra and unequalled mantra

27 Cure of every sorrow, true because not false.
All is true because not false. Asserting what is false or following what leads to falsity is a misunderstanding of all that is true. Though false is 100% false and true is 100% true, in wisdom all is true (emptiness and totality) when understood by a ripe hearted one.

28 In Perfect Wisdom is the mantra spoken:
29 GATE' GATE' PARAGATE' PARASAMGATE' BODHI SVAHA

Go, go, go, beyond, way beyond. Right here and now. Go, never linger, like a sage traveling along the scenery, down the road and out of sight. As the great Huang Po said, " The highest levels of enlightenment can be transcended." What a powerful statement and what a wonderful message. Non-attainment and maturity, love, unconditioned and emptiness to the core and then again empty. Unconditional love is the most profound entry into the deepest recesses of understanding because it is unobstructed neutrality and acceptance. Possibility is the power in every moment so, gate'gate'paragate'parasamgate'bodhi svaha. Carry on and never cease to carry on, never linger, always and forever carry on.

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