Geshe Dawa Tsering: The Two Truths - Conventional Truth and Ultimate Truth

Geshe Dawa Tsering: The Two Truths - Conventional Truth and Ultimate Truth

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Series: The Great Non-sectarian Conference on Acharya Shantideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra (41 tracks)

Descriptionངོ་སྤྲོད།

In this teaching, Geshe Dawa Tsering explains བདེན་གཉིས་རྣམ་བཞག (The Two Truths) — Conventional Truth and Ultimate Truth — a fundamental concept in Buddhist philosophy.

This talk helps listeners understand how appearances and reality are explained in Madhyamaka philosophy, and how realizing the Two Truths is essential for developing wisdom and progressing on the path to liberation.

The teaching is presented clearly and traditionally, making it beneficial for both beginners and advanced students of Buddhism.

Citation

Tsering, Geshe Dawa. "The Two Truths - Conventional Truth and Ultimate Truth." Discussion session during a seminar on the Bodhicaryāvatāra (The Guide to the Bodhisattva's Way of Life) titled "The Great Non-sectarian Conference on Acharya Shantideva's Bodhicaryāvatāra and the Noble and Sacred Deeds of His Holiness the Great 14th Dalai Lama" held Dec 28, 2025–Jan 1, 2026 at Drepung Loseling Prayer Hall. Video, 26:35. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMJr76TpHZg.

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Scholarly presentation about

 

Bodhicaryāvatāraབྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའི་སྤྱོད་པ་ལ་འཇུག་པ།

An "Introduction to Bodhisattva Practice," the Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra is a poem about the path of a bodhisattva, in ten chapters, written by the Indian Buddhist Śāntideva (fl. c. 685–763). One of the masterpieces of world literature, it is a core text of Mahāyāna Buddhism and continues to be taught, studied, and commented upon in many languages and by many traditions around the world. The main subject of the text is bodhicitta, the altruistic aspiration for enlightenment, and the path and practices of the bodhisattva, the six perfections (pāramitās). The text forms the basis of many contemporary discussions of Buddhist ethics and philosophy.

Text

Nariman, Gushtaspshah Kaikhushro. "Shantideva." In Literary History of Sanskrit Buddhism: (From Winternitz, Sylvain Levi, Huber), 100-109. Bombay: Indian Book Depot, 1923. https://archive.org/details/literaryhistoryo00nariuoft/page/100/mode/2up.

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Śāntideva (ཞི་བ་ལྷ་). Bodhicaryāvatāra [बोधिचर्यावतार]. byang chub sems dpa'i spyod pa la 'jug pa [བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའི་སྤྱོད་པ་ལ་འཇུག་པ།]. [The Way of the Bodhisattva]. Tengyur, RKTST 3216 http://www.rkts.org/cat.php?id=3216&typ=2.

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Weeraratne, D. Amarasiri. "Bodhicaryāvatāra." The Maha-Bodhi 79, nos. 2–3 (1971): 406–9.

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Madhyamaka - Along with Yogācāra, it is one of the two major philosophical schools of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Founded by Nāgārjuna around the second century CE, it is rooted in the Prajñāpāramitā Sūtras, though its initial exposition was presented in Nāgārjuna's Mūlamadhyamakakārikā. Skt मध्यमक  Tib དབུ་མ་  Ch 中觀見  

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Bodhisattva - A person who seeks enlightenment for the sake of others. In Mahāyāna Buddhism, a Bodhisattva is a compassionate being who is training on the path to Buddhahood and aspires to eliminate the suffering of all beings and take all sentient beings to the state of enlightenment. The Mahāyāna sūtras including those on buddha-nature generally have Bodhisattvas as the main audience or interlocutors for the Buddha's discourses. Skt बोधिसत्त्व  Tib བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའ།  Ch 菩薩  

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Bodhisattva - A person who seeks enlightenment for the sake of others. In Mahāyāna Buddhism, a Bodhisattva is a compassionate being who is training on the path to Buddhahood and aspires to eliminate the suffering of all beings and take all sentient beings to the state of enlightenment. The Mahāyāna sūtras including those on buddha-nature generally have Bodhisattvas as the main audience or interlocutors for the Buddha's discourses. Skt बोधिसत्त्व  Tib བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའ།  Ch 菩薩  

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Śāntideva (ཞི་བ་ལྷ་). Bodhicaryāvatāra [बोधिचर्यावतार]. byang chub sems dpa'i spyod pa la 'jug pa [བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའི་སྤྱོད་པ་ལ་འཇུག་པ།]. [The Way of the Bodhisattva]. Tengyur, RKTST 3216 http://www.rkts.org/cat.php?id=3216&typ=2.

Go to the page with the definition of 'བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའི་སྤྱོད་པ་ལ་འཇུག་པ།'

Bodhisattva - A person who seeks enlightenment for the sake of others. In Mahāyāna Buddhism, a Bodhisattva is a compassionate being who is training on the path to Buddhahood and aspires to eliminate the suffering of all beings and take all sentient beings to the state of enlightenment. The Mahāyāna sūtras including those on buddha-nature generally have Bodhisattvas as the main audience or interlocutors for the Buddha's discourses. Skt बोधिसत्त्व  Tib བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའ།  Ch 菩薩  

Go to the page with the definition of 'bodhisattva'

Bodhisattva - A person who seeks enlightenment for the sake of others. In Mahāyāna Buddhism, a Bodhisattva is a compassionate being who is training on the path to Buddhahood and aspires to eliminate the suffering of all beings and take all sentient beings to the state of enlightenment. The Mahāyāna sūtras including those on buddha-nature generally have Bodhisattvas as the main audience or interlocutors for the Buddha's discourses. Skt बोधिसत्त्व  Tib བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས་དཔའ།  Ch 菩薩  

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Lang, Karen. "Śāntideva." In Buddhist Philosophy from 600 to 750 A.D., edited by Karl H. Potter, 137–39. Vol. 21 of Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2017.

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Goodman, Charles. "Śāntideva." In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Accessed March 15, 2021. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/shantideva/

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Potter, Karl H., David J. Kalupahana, and Michael J. Sweet. "Śāntideva." In Buddhist Philosophy from 600 to 750 A.D., edited by Karl H. Potter, 516–25. Vol. 21 of Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2017.

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Potter, Karl H. ed. "Śāntideva." In Bibliography: Part 1, Texts Whose Authors Can Be Dated; Authors Listed Chronologically, 5th through 9th Century. Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies. Online edition. Last updated Apr 15, 2020. https://faculty.washington.edu/kpotter/xtxt2.htm.

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Lele, Amod. "Śāntideva." In Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by James Fieser and Bradley Dowden. Accessed Feb. 11, 2021. https://iep.utm.edu/santideva/.

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Tsukamoto, Keisho, Yukei Matsunaga, and Hirofumi Isoda, eds. "Śāntideva." In A Descriptive Bibliography of the Sanskrit Buddhist Literature. Vol. 3, Abhidharma, Madhyamaka, Yogācāra, Buddhist Epistemology and Logic, 250–69. Kyoto: Heirakuji-Shoten, 1990.

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Mahāyāna - Mahāyāna, or the Great Vehicle, refers to the system of Buddhist thought and practice which developed around the beginning of Common Era, focusing on the pursuit of the state of full enlightenment of the Buddha through the realization of the wisdom of emptiness and the cultivation of compassion. Skt महायान  Tib ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོ།  Ch 大乘  

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Bodhicitta - The altruistic thought to seek enlightenment for the sake of all sentient beings. It is said to have two aspects: compassion aimed at sentient beings and their problems and the wisdom of enlightenment as the solution. Skt बोधिचित्त  Tib བྱང་ཆུབ་སེམས།  Ch 菩提心  

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Pāramitā - The six or ten types of practices which lead an individual to Buddhahood. The practice of perfections is particularly important in Mahāyāna Buddhism in which the entire path of the Bodhisattva to reach full enlightenment is included in the six or ten perfections. The six perfections are that of giving, of discipline, patience, zeal, meditation, and wisdom. The perfection of skill-in-means, aspirations, power, and pristine wisdom are added to them to make ten perfections. Skt पारमिता  Tib ཕར་ཕྱིན། and ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ།  Ch 波羅蜜  

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