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the arhat is already liberated

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Mahayana says that is still not enough

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at the end of the last episode we said

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Mahayana Buddhism redefined the ultimate goal of practice

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from liberating yourself to liberating all beings

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from the arhat path to the bodhisattva path

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I asked a question

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is the end of practice

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the stillness of one person

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or the awakening of everyone

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today

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we take this question apart head on

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hello

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hi everyone

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I am Leo Wang

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to understand why this revolution in goals happened

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we have to go back to what the word arhat originally meant

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in early Buddhism

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the arhat is the highest fruit of practice

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the Pali word arahant

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literally means one who is worthy of offerings

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later it was extended to mean slayer of thieves

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meaning one who has killed the thief of affliction

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the arhat has cut off greed hatred and delusion completely

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and is no longer pulled back into samsara by anything

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he pulled suffering out by the root

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this is the ultimate goal the Buddha pointed to

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ending suffering

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liberation from birth and death

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in the time of the Buddha

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this was not controversial at all

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while the Buddha himself was alive

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he never treated arhat and Buddha

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as two things on different levels

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in the earliest Pali scriptures

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arhat is one of the most common titles of the Buddha

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appearing alongside Tathagata and Fully Awakened One

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the Four Noble Truths the Eightfold Path the thirty seven factors

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the whole system of practice points at one clear thing ending suffering

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cutting off rebirth

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for centuries

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countless practitioners bet their entire lives on this goal

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Sariputta did it

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Moggallana did it

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Maha Kassapa did it

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and so did countless nameless monks and nuns

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this was not theory

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it was proof paid for with an entire lifetime

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but this is exactly where the problem starts

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before the Buddha became a Buddha

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what did he go through

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he did not just realize arhatship and stop there

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under the bodhi tree he spent an entire night

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seeing the full panorama of dependent origination

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after awakening he made one crucial choice he did not simply pass into nirvana

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legend says Brahma came to request the teaching

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the Buddha hesitated for a moment

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then decided to stay and teach

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and that teaching

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lasted forty five years

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until his body could no longer hold up

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if the arhat is the finish line

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then what were the forty five years after the Buddha awakened

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the standard early Buddhist answer goes like this

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the Buddha awakened himself and awakened others

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the arhat awakened himself

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the Buddha was the one who with no teacher to guide him

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found his way through the entire path

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the arhat walked it through under the guidance of the Buddha

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the difference is who found the road first

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not in where the two of them arrived

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this explanation held up well enough for the first few centuries

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but as the sectarian schools developed

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a crack appeared and kept getting deeper

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the things the Buddha could do

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could an arhat do them

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the Buddha could teach for forty five years

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giving completely different teachings based on each person's capacity

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one kind of metaphor for the young

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another kind for the old

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words a king could understand for a king

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and a shepherd's language for a shepherd

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the Buddha had what later treatises summed up as the ten powers

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he knew the many dispositions of beings

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he knew how cause and effect ran from end to end

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he knew where every path of practice actually led

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the early scriptures record all of this clearly

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does an arhat have any of it

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in most scriptural descriptions

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no

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the arhat has cut off affliction

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but does not have the panoramic wisdom of the Buddha

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or his limitless capacity to teach

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so here is the question

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if the Buddha and the arhat arrive at the same place

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where do these differences come from

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Mahayana Buddhism did not invent this doubt out of thin air

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its seed had already begun sprouting inside the sectarian schools

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we covered this in earlier episodes

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roughly one to three hundred years after the Buddha died

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a famous claim appeared within the Mahasamghika tradition

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the arhat still has something left

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in other words

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the arhat has cut off affliction

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but may still carry some subtle incompleteness

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the Mahasamghika even put forward the so called Five Points of Mahadeva

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claiming an arhat can still be tempted in dreams

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can still have undefiled ignorance and can still have doubt

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and may even need someone else to confirm his own attainment

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this caused an uproar at the time

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the Theravada firmly opposed it

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but the argument itself shows something crucial

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the absolute perfection of the arhat

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was not something everyone believed without question

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the seed of doubt

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was already buried at the time of the first great schism

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what Mahayana Buddhism did

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seen historically

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was water a seed that was already there

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it said

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the arhat really has cut off affliction

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and really is done with rebirth

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that much is fully granted

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but

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there is more than one kind of obstruction

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Mahayana introduced a distinction that changed everything

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the affliction obstruction and the cognitive obstruction

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the affliction obstruction is greed hatred and delusion the forces that make you suffer in samsara

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the arhat has cut all of these off

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so what is the cognitive obstruction

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it is not the thing that makes you suffer

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it is a subtler veil over what you can know

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here is an analogy

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you wipe away all the dust in front of your eyes

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no more pain no more itch

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but your field of vision is still limited

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the world you see is clear

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but you are only seeing one corner of the whole picture

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you no longer suffer

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but you have not fully seen

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this difference is subtle

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stop and think for a moment

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about whether your daily life has moments like this

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the problem is solved

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but something still feels missing

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in the Mahayana framework

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the reason the Buddha could do what an arhat could not

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teaching for forty five years improvising for each person's capacity

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walking every kind of detour with beings with endless patience

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was not that he tried harder or had more grit

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it was that he cleared both obstructions at once

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he did not just put out his own fire

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he saw the whole burning field

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once this distinction was established

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the map of practice was completely rewritten

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the arhat is no longer the finish line

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but an extremely important waypoint along the road

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the finish line was pushed much further out becoming a Buddha

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and the long journey from arhat to Buddha

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needed a new road

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that road is called the bodhisattva path

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but Mahayana did not invent the idea of the bodhisattva

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it was there in the earliest Buddhist tradition

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the Pali word bodhisatta

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means a being who seeks awakening

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it is just that in early Buddhism

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the word almost only meant Shakyamuni before he became a Buddha

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across countless past lives he gave kept precepts endured and persevered

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accumulating enough of the paramitas

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before awakening as a Buddha in this final life

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these past life stories were collected in the Jataka tales

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five hundred and forty seven stories in all

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every one of them tells the same thing

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before the Buddha became a Buddha

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he had already walked a very very long road

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did you notice

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in early Buddhism

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bodhisattva was an exclusive word

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reserved for the past lives of the Buddha and the future Buddha Maitreya

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the goal for an ordinary practitioner was arhatship

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you were not qualified to walk the bodhisattva path

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because that road belonged to Buddhas

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what did Mahayana do

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it opened that route to everyone

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it said

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becoming a Buddha is not the private patent of Shakyamuni

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every being can arouse bodhicitta walk the bodhisattva path and finally become a Buddha

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the difference between you and the Buddha is not a difference in kind

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it is a difference in time

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he finished the road you are walking first

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that is all

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this was a fundamental opening of access

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from only one person can become a Buddha to everyone has that possibility

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and the sharpest argument of Mahayana is not a moral one

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it is a philosophical one

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if you truly understand non self

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there is no essential boundary between any phenomena

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my suffering and your suffering

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are vibrations on one net at the level of dependent origination

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so how could you possibly say

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I am liberated

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and it has nothing to do with you

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the Mahayana logic is

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someone who has truly and completely realized dependent origination

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cannot possibly care only about himself

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not because he should be compassionate

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but because he has already seen

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that self and all beings were never two separate things

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compassion is not a moral add on

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it is what wisdom naturally becomes when carried all the way

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as Mahayana sees it

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the choice of the arhat to pass into nirvana alone

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hints that his realization of non self is one layer short

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because deep down he still keeps an invisible line

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this is my liberation

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that is other people's business

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feel into this carefully

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is that line in your heart too

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it is the last trace the cognitive obstruction leaves

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of course

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this is the Mahayana argument

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not every tradition accepts it

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Theravada Buddhism has never agreed that the arhat falls short

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in their system

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the arhat is fully awakened

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the Buddha and the arhat differ in who came first

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not in how deep they went

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over two thousand years later

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this disagreement is still unsettled

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I am not going to take a side

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what I want is for you to see the structure of the disagreement

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because it is not just an academic argument

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it is a basic question about what awakening actually means

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if awakening is only the ending of your own suffering

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then the arhat is the finish line

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if awakening means seeing every face of reality completely

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including how inseparable you are from all life

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then ending only your own suffering really is not enough

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because your understanding has not gone all the way

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but upgrading the goal brought new risks too

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the arhat path has a clear and concrete map

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the Four Noble Truths the Eightfold Path precepts and meditation

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attainable in one life or a few

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and the bodhisattva path

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vow to liberate every being

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practice the six paramitas for three incalculable eons

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in some scriptural descriptions

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this journey is nearly eternal

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when the finish line is pushed infinitely far away

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a practitioner easily falls into a new kind of bind

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I made a grand vow

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and then what

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in the middle of ordinary daily life

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how does that vow actually land

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does the bodhisattva path become a check that never clears

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this is not later speculation

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it is a real tension Mahayana faced from the very start

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many later Mahayana texts

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like the Way of the Bodhisattva by Shantideva

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and the Yogacarabhumi recorded by Asanga

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are all answering the same question

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how do you actually walk the bodhisattva path step by step

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as for the concrete framework of practice

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the scripture series will unpack it later on

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there is also a sociological dimension we cannot ignore

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the arhat path was mainly walked by monastics

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you had to give up worldly life

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and throw yourself fully into meditation and discipline

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for the vast majority of lay people

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that bar was far too high

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you have a family

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a job

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elders and children

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how could you possibly live like a monk

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the bodhisattva path opened a door

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it said practice is not only meditation and cutting off desire

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it is also giving patience effort and wisdom

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things a layperson can do too

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you can walk the path of awakening without ordaining

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seen this way

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Mahayana was not only a philosophical breakthrough

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it also lowered the barrier to entry for practice

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as Buddhism moved from an elite monastic tradition

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into wider interaction with lay communities

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adjusting the goal of practice was almost historically inevitable

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scholars disagree about this

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some think a lay movement gave birth to Mahayana

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others argue

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that the first to push it were forest monks practicing austerities

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who felt the mainstream monasteries had gotten too comfortable

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and had drifted away from the spirit of the Buddha

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who first lit the spark of Mahayana

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is still unsettled

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but one thing is clear this turn brewed for centuries

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growing slowly in the gaps between the sectarian schools

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it did not happen overnight

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finally

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let us look at it through the calibration anchor of this whole series

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does the turn from arhat to bodhisattva

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move closer to what the Buddha saw under the bodhi tree

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or further away from it

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my view is

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both at once

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the part that got closer

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if the core insight of the Buddha was dependent origination and non self

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then Mahayana pushed non self to its logical limit

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if there is really no self

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how could you care only about your own liberation

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that reasoning really does go further

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the part that got further away

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when the goal shifts from the clear task of ending suffering

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to the grand vow of liberating all beings

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it is easy to lose your bearings inside a beautiful vision

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and forget the plainest instruction of the Buddha

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see the suffering at your feet

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the suffering of this moment

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everything else can wait

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history has already proven this risk

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some later Mahayana traditions did drift into ever more ornate narratives

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away from the Buddha walking barefoot on the Ganges plain

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ending suffering face to face that plain starting point

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further and further away

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both sides exist at the same time

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admitting both of them

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is more honest than picking a side

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someone in the comments asked a really good question

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does bodhicitta contradict non self

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you make a grand vow to liberate every being

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is that not the biggest self grasping of all

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that question goes straight to the heart of Mahayana

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and the sutra that answers it that philosophical breakthrough

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set off the loudest thunderclap of the entire Mahayana revolution

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it is called the Prajnaparamita sutras

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it pushes the word emptiness to a limit that unsettles everyone

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do you think awakening should stop at the arhat

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or keep going toward the bodhisattva

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tell me what you think in the comments

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I am Leo Wang

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see you next time