The Truth and The Path

Okay? But the other week, uh, I was leading it here.

Or actually, it was about two months ago.

I was doing the Threefold Puja here, and this line in the puja just jumped out and hit me.

You know? I, what? I've been reciting that for 45 years without noticing what it meant.

Okay? Um, and basically the line was, um, "The truth in all its aspects, the path in all its stages." I didn't notice it.

I didn't notice it.

The truth in all its aspects, the path in all its stages, it's all of Buddhism in one sentence.

It's all there.

And in fact, the Buddha, he, he called it, um, Dharma Vinaya.

Dharma Vinaya.

Dharma are all the truths.

All the truths.

Uh, things are impermanent.

Um, there's no, like, a, a essential self.

There's no sort of, you can't find a kern- you know, some sort of heart of a self in there.

You know? It's all sort of process.

Uh, life ultimately is disappointing.

[laughs] That is, uh, one of these truths, you know? So that's what the, the Dharma was.

You know? The, um, the truth in all its aspects.

They're just truths.

Yeah? Things are impermanent, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Uh, then the next part is the Vinaya, the practices.

The practices you do in order to see these truths.

All right? So, uh, so the Buddha, he never had a word like Buddhism.

You know? Uh, these isms, they're all quite modern.