trying to be responsive because that's the kind of

kind of operation we've got going here.

All right so tonight

gonna give a talk, then the meditation. So there's a kind of unusual small group of suitas where the Buddha talks about what's called itty pati hariam which means the powers of the mind and he describes

them in these suitas in the exact same language,

with a developed powerful mind one can become different things or different beings appear and vanish, move unimpeded through mountains like moving

through space.

One can dive in and out of the earth as if it were water and walk on water as if dry land

while sitting one can fly through the air like a winged bird touching the sun or moon.

One hears both the divine and human.

This is in B bunch of suitas kavata and the sengarava and then there's in another

suit he says if you have the developed powerful mind you could turn a pile of wood into water or fire or wind.

So when we hear this kind of language it's easy to interpret it in two possible ways.

We could be very fundamentalist about it all and take it literally.

If you're religious and you're fundamentalist, you take everything that's written as if it's an accurate description.

So you literally would believe that the Buddhist an accurate description.

So you literally would believe that the Buddha is talking about moving through mountains,

uh... diving in and out of the earth as if it were water, walking on water, flying through the air while sitting.

So that's a literalist interpretation.

I am not a literalist interpretation. I am not a literalist. But then if one was going to be

entirely secular, one could simply write this off as a metaphoric, poetic, figurative description of what was, what might be, you know,

trying to just capture how powerful the mind can be.

...