Review 1 of Chapter 8: Verses 184-188
Review 1 of Chapter 8: Verses 184-188
Venerable Thubten Semkye 
Aryadeva's 400 Stanzas 
May 8, 2014 The teachings on Chapter 8 of Aryadeva’s 400 Stanzas on the Middle Way show the methods of training the student’s mindstream to make it receptive to a spiritual path.
- Wanting happiness that lasts, but not knowing how to create the causes
- Importance of understanding emptiness
- Giving up the fear of emptiness
- If actions existed inherently there would be no liberation
- Giving up polluted virtuous and non-virtuous actions
- Impossible to attain liberation without generating an aversion to samsara
- Importance of striving for liberation after looking at the miseries of cyclic existence
53 Aryadeva’s 400 Stanzas: Chapter 8 review 1, part 2 (download)
Venerable Thubten Semkye
Ven. Semkye was the Abbey's first lay resident, coming to help Venerable Chodron with the gardens and land management in the spring of 2004. She became the Abbey's third nun in 2007 and received bhikshuni ordination in Taiwan in 2010. She met Venerable Chodron at the Dharma Friendship Foundation in Seattle in 1996. She took refuge in 1999. When the land was acquired for the Abbey in 2003, Ven. Semye coordinated volunteers for the initial move-in and early remodeling. A founder of Friends of Sravasti Abbey, she accepted the position of chairperson to provide the Four Requisites for the monastic community. Realizing that was a difficult task to do from 350 miles away, she moved to the Abbey in spring of 2004. Although she didn't originally see ordination in her future, after the 2006 Chenrezig retreat when she spent half of her meditation time reflecting on death and impermanence, Ven. Semkye realized that ordaining would be the wisest, most compassionate use of her life. View pictures of her ordination. Ven. Semkye draws on her extensive experience in landscaping and horticulture to manage the Abbey's forests and gardens. She oversees "Offering Volunteer Service Weekends" during which volunteers help with construction, gardening, and forest stewardship.
