Transliteration: go ba
I. <verb> v.i. གོ་བ་/ གོ་བ་/ གོ་བ་//. Transitive form is ཉན་པ་ q.v. 1) "To hear and know what has been heard". It has exactly the same significance as the use of "to hear" in English when a parent says to a child, "Did you hear me?" meaning "Did you hear and understand what I said?" The child replies back, "I heard you!" meaning "Yes, I heard and understood!" E.g., [TC] གོ་བ་བརྒྱ་ལས་མཐོང་བ་གཅིག་ལྷག "seeing something once is better than hearing about it one hundred times" (like "a picture is worth one thousand words"; སྐད་ཆ་དེ་འདྲ་གཏན་ནས་གོ་མ་མྱོང་། "I didn't get (hear and understand) what was said for certain"; ཚང་མ་གསལ་པོར་གོ་བྱུང་། "I heard the whole thing clearly". 2) "To understand" meaning simple intellectual comprehension; similar to the first meaning but without the "hearing" component. This is the same as ཧ་གོ་བ་ in which the ཧ་ makes it definite that the mental aspect of understanding is being indicated. In normal conversation and in classical writing both གོ་བ་ and ཧ་གོ་བ་ are used interchangeably. E.g., གོ་སླ་བོ། "easy to understand"; གོ་དཀའ་བ། "hard to understand". E.g., [TC] སྨྲ་ཤེས་དོན་གོ "being aware of what was said and understanding the meaning of it"; གོ་བ་ལྷང་ཙམ་བྱུང་བ། "I had just a clear understanding"; གོ་བ་ལོག་པ། "wrong understanding / mis-understanding"; གཞུང་དོན་གོ་དཀའ་བ། "a text whose meaning is difficult to understand". 3) "To convey a (certain understanding)" e.g., in གོ་ནུས་པ་ q.v.II. <noun> "Comprehension", "understanding" in the most common sense of the word. Accordingly, in Buddhist texts it has the defined sense of "intellectual understanding / comprehension only" and is regarded as lesser than ཉམས་ meditative experience which is in turn lesser than རྟོགས་པ་ realization. As Padmasaṃbhava said, གོ་བ་ལྷན་པ་ལྷུན་འདྲ་སྟེ་འགྲོ། "intellectual understanding, like a patch falling off, slips away". Also, e.g., in the term གོ་བ་སྐམ་པོ་ "dry intellectual understanding" meaning "all theory and no practical experience". E.g., [TC] མི་དེའི་གོ་བ་ཟབ་པོ་འདུག "that person has a deep understanding"; གོ་བ་མེད་པའི་གླང་རྒན་ལ། lit. "the old cow with no comprehension" but "the stupid old cow".