Teaching on Interdependent Arising

In this teaching, Khenpo Sherab Sangpo, a professor of Buddhism and Spiritual Director of Bodhicitta Sangha | Heart of Enlightenment Institute in Minneapolis, teaches his students on the importance of understanding the Buddhist Middle Way philosophy that all phenomena arise due to interdependent origination (dependent arising). Without understanding that everything arises due to causes and conditions, a student cannot realize the union of appearance and emptiness; and therefore their realization of the nature of reality is blocked. As Nagarjuna, the great Middle Way philosopher, stated: “That which arises interdependently does not cease and does not arise. It is not nothing and not eternal. It does not come and does not go. It is not different and not the same. To the one who teaches peace, the pacification of all projections, to the most sublime of all who speak, to the perfect Buddha, I pay homage!” Through the use of logic and philosophical reasoning one can arrive at the certainty that Buddhism only seeks to point out the true nature of reality; and, in this way, is both a science of the mind and a path of practice that enables the student via meditation to directly view the nature of reality. Once the view has been recognized and stabilized, then naturally compassion for those who are not seeing the truth of their nature dawns. For if one does not recognize the impermanent nature of all reality and tries to hold on to a permanent, fixed concept of self or other phenomena, then one will suffer when changes, such as birth, death, sickness and old age appear. To help beings awaken to their true nature, the Buddha taught interdependent arising, impermanence, and the insight that each appearance is empty of inherent, permanent existence. The teaching closes with a meditation using a visualized object that moves gently with the breath to calm the mind and lessen conceptual thoughts that block the experience of a spacious mind that can rest in meditation vividly recognizing the nature of mind.