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What is difference between consciousness and awareness
"xabir, what faculty in you establishes that your awareness is conditional? If there is such a faculty then either that faculty is unconditional or it is conditional. If it is conditional you need a third faculty to establish that. That faculty would also either be conditional or unconditional. This would lead to needing a fourth faculty to establish the conditional nature of the third faculty."
I don't understand what you mean by the faculty needs a third or fourth faculty to establish it.
It is very simple, the teachings of eighteen dhatus state that the 6 consciousness arises in dependence of the six sense objects and six sense faculties.
For example, when eye and form assumes their right relation, a visual consciousness takes place
Of course, eye and form is also dependent on many conditions but we don't have to go into that.
Arya Nagarjuna:
38. When eye and form assume their right relation,
Appearances appear without a blur. Since these neither arise nor cease, They are the dharmadhatu, though they are imagined to be otherwise.
39. When sound and ear assume their right relation, A consciousness free of thought occurs. These three are in essence the dharmadhatu, free of other characteristics, But they become "hearing" when thought of conceptually.
40. Dependent upon the nose and an odor, one smells. And as with the example of form there is neither arising nor cessation, But in dependence upon the nose-consciousness’s experience, The dharmadhatu is thought to be smell.
41. The tongue’s nature is emptiness. The sphere of taste is voidness as well. These are in essence the dharmadhatu And are not the causes of the taste consciousness.
42. The pure body’s essence, The characteristics of the object touched, The tactile consciousness free of conditions— These are called the dharmadhatu.
43. The phenomena that appear to the mental consciousness, the chief of them all, Are conceptualized and then superimposed. When this activity is abandoned, phenomena’s lack of self-essence is known. Knowing this, meditate on the dharmadhatu.
44. And so is all that is seen or heard or smelled, Tasted, touched, and imagined, When yogis [and yoginis]* understand these in this manner, All their wonderful qualities are brought to consummation.
45. Perception’s doors in eyes and ears and nose, In tongue and body and the mental gate— All these six are utterly pure. These consciousnesses’ purity itself is suchness’ defining characteristic.
If your interested Lama Shenpen wrote a book called the Buddha Within. I will read your comments later and reflect on them, but I don't feel I can have much a debate with you other than quoting former e-mail discussions with my teacher and group mailings.
I haven't read the Buddha Within as I didn't have enough background. My current practice is mainly focused on easing up. Easing up the body and mind. Pema Chodron and Sogyal Rinpoche say that Shunyata is being spacious, easing up, being big and generous about things, and seeing them with new eyes.
I find the Gelug school too intellectual but I will attempt your discussion. I am on a lot of psychiatric medications and I have a mental illness which makes it difficult for me to follow complex conceptualization. I find that just examining an experience with wonder and being simple and undemanding is a better realization than having a blue print.
"I don't understand what you mean by the faculty needs a third or fourth faculty to establish it.
It is very simple, the teachings of eighteen dhatus state that the 6 consciousness arises in dependence of the six sense objects and six sense faculties.
For example, when eye and form assumes their right relation, a visual consciousness takes place
Of course, eye and form is also dependent on many conditions but we don't have to go into that."
What faculty establishes that the eye consciousness is dependent upon an eye?
"45. Perception’s doors in eyes and ears and nose, In tongue and body and the mental gate— All these six are utterly pure. These consciousnesses’ purity itself is suchness’ defining characteristic."
This supports an unconditioned non-composite awareness. Otherwise these six are all impure (dukkha).
Dukkha is not real. The (ungraspable) self is the only reality. Love. Buddha nature. Citta. Bodhicitta.
"41. The tongue’s nature is emptiness. The sphere of taste is voidness as well. These are in essence the dharmadhatu And are not the causes of the taste consciousness."
This also contradicts what you said. The tongue is not the cause of taste consciousness.
you may not be aware that you are conscious. you may not be conscious that you are aware. the second sentence is untrue. if you are unconscious, you cant be aware.
In a dream you are unconscious and aware. I guess it depends what you mean by conscious. The way you say it they are just tautological the same which I would find the first statement the same as the second.
What faculty establishes that the eye consciousness is dependent upon an eye?
You should ask, what faculty establishes that eye consciousness is independent from the eye.
That is not a faculty... that is ignorance. Ignorance being the view of things existing independently, inherently, permanently.
If there is wisdom, it is directly seen how every manifestation dependently originates. The entire universe with all its requisite conditions is exerting itself as this moment of experience and action.
"41. The tongue’s nature is emptiness. The sphere of taste is voidness as well. These are in essence the dharmadhatu And are not the causes of the taste consciousness."
This also contradicts what you said. The tongue is not the cause of taste consciousness.
Tongue does not cause consciousness, nor is consciousness independent of tongue. Consciousness is not created, nor is it inherently existing.
For example: stick, drum, action of hitting, air, all these come together... and a new phenomenon of ear consciousness, the act of hearing drumbeats, arise.
The act of hearing drumbeats did not come from the air, did not come from the stick, did not come from the action of hitting. Rather, it is that all these requisite conditions come together, a new and complete phenomenon of 'hearing drumbeat' manifest.
Nothing is created by something else... and nothing exists independently.
"It's not the case, Kotthita my friend, that consciousness is self-made, that it is other-made, that it is both self-made & other-made, or that — without self-making or other-making — it arises spontaneously. However, from name-&-form as a requisite condition comes consciousness."
"45. Perception’s doors in eyes and ears and nose, In tongue and body and the mental gate— All these six are utterly pure. These consciousnesses’ purity itself is suchness’ defining characteristic."
This supports an unconditioned non-composite awareness. Otherwise these six are all impure (dukkha).
Dukkha is not real. The (ungraspable) self is the only reality. Love. Buddha nature. Citta. Bodhicitta.
They are pure due to its emptiness (empty of inherent existence).
They are not pure due to being an independent, unchanging substance.
For example you might see something dirty - but the fly sees it as beautiful - and the deva may see something else. Why? That object you think is dirty has no inherent existence. It is empty of 'dirty' characteristic... it is not inherently dirty. It is a dependently originated appearance. As such, it is pure, but it is not pure as contrast to impurity. The purity is simply the absence of impurity... not a contrasting purity.
As Heart Sutra states,
Shariputra, all dharmas are marked with emptiness, (They) do not appear or disappear, are not tainted or pure
It 'de-establishes' that there are entities... as there is nothing self-existing on its own, but are merely a dependently originated appearance.
D.O. deconstructs entities into an ungraspable process, activity of interdependent interaction.
A red flower for human is a black flower for dogs is a .... for something else, is 99.999% space for quantum vision, the image dependently originates and no phenomena exists in and of itself. Red flower is red only due to the dependently originated mode of cognition... there is no inherent red flower.
One must establish DO. Otherwise you wouldn't know if it were true or not. I guess you could say that the world is made of cheese. And that were the true nature. And that if we realized that we would be free of suffering. Couldn't you?
One must establish DO. Otherwise you wouldn't know if it were true or not. I guess you could say that the world is made of cheese. And that were the true nature. And that if we realized that we would be free of suffering. Couldn't you?
Establish means establishing things existing independently.
You do not need to establish DO when you see everything as a process of interdependent action... with nothing that can be pinned down as a reality/existence of itself.
For example... you can't pin down 'red flower' as a reality - red flower is apparently red due to various conditions.
Why aren't you enlightened? Don't you realize all this stuff you are saying? Or are you saying you have to 'really' 'deeply' realize it by going in a trance for 50 years meditating?
Requisite conditions coming together is an intellectual way of saying 'cause'
Cause means there is an originator. Cause and creation establishes an independent agent, and an independent object of creation.
If everything dependently originates, there is no 'something' causing 'something'... There is neither agent nor an independent object being created.
Like the red flower... is merely a dependently originated image due to various karmic, biological conditionings, there is no red flower existing in itself, much less a red flower being created by something.
Also, like the drum, act of hitting, air, ear, etc... no source can be pinpointed, rather with all these requisite conditions, a new and complete phenomonon manifest but you cannot say the air made this, or the drum made this. Dependent origination contradicts the notion of an origin, cause, creator, and created.
"Cause means there is an originator. Cause and creation establishes an independent agent, and an independent object of creation."
Thats how we speak english. Your language is inaccesible. I have studied buddhism for 10 years. Even someone who has not studied buddhism at all might not mean an independent object of creation. You don't have to study theory to have insight into reality.
"Like the red flower... is merely a dependently originated image due to various karmic, biological conditionings, there is no red flower existing in itself, much less a red flower being created by something."
So enlightenment is suffering. Buddha is suffering. You cannot rely on Buddha.
You are mistaking things.
Impermanent things are unsatisfactory.
That is not saying that all impermanent things are afflictions.
You can remove afflictions (that is what Buddha did), but even after afflictions are removed, all things still bear the characteristic of unsatisfactoriness.
That is why the Garab Dorje Rinpoche said that, "Even with 5 Wisdoms, the Buddha was unable to find happiness in Samsara."
It certainly does not mean the Buddha was unhappy. It simply means that unsatisfactoriness is a fact of all things impermanent.
If they are unsatisfactory after removal of inflections then they still are afflicted. Why would anyone want suffering in Nirvana? Unsatisfactory in english means that you don't want or like it. So you would have to not feel good as a buddha.
You are saying all things are impermanent including buddha.
There is no inherent red flower. I am not saying there is anything inherent. Can you point out where I did?
Objects are not inherent for you, but Awareness is. But even Awareness it empty... there is no inherent existence to Awareness.
When insight of anatta arises, it is seen that awareness is simply the seen, heard, smelled. In seeing there is just the seen, no seer. In hearing just the heard, no hearer. Hearing is the heard, seeing is the seen.
And further insights show how awareness, being the seen, heard, smelled, dependently originates.
This is what Nagarjuna is describing... that all consciousnesses dependently originated, and as such are empty, pure, and luminous.
If they are unsatisfactory after removal of inflections then they still are afflicted. Why would anyone want suffering in Nirvana? Unsatisfactory in english means that you don't want or like it. So you would have to not feel good as a buddha.
You are saying all things are impermanent including buddha.
No. I think Dhamma Dhatu can explain better than I do at this.
Unsatisfactoriness does not imply things are afflicted.
It just means all things, lacking permanency, cannot be satisfactory.
Afflictions means, there is clinging to things as me and mine, resulting in attachments, suffering, craving, anger, fear, etc. There is delusion of I, of satisfactoriness, of permanence, and as a result there is those afflictions stated.
You can remove afflictions, you cannot remove the fact that things are unsatisfactory.
Nirvana is the end of clinging, suffering, afflictions.
Why aren't you enlightened? Don't you realize all this stuff you are saying? Or are you saying you have to 'really' 'deeply' realize it by going in a trance for 50 years meditating?
Who said I wasn't enlightened or that I was? Why are you even asking this? I can't see its bearing on this discussion.
I never said you need to go into a trance of meditate for 50 years. Where did you even get that idea?
You and I might have a different idea of establish.
What I mean by establish is establishing things to have real existence... as nothing can be established to have real existence, nothing can be established.
As for 'who sees', this is a wrong question as it presumes a seer. There is no seer. Seeing happens when requisite conditions are there. There is no agent.
Well I ask you then. Are you enlightened? I am asking you to examine this question. You don't have to tell me. And then if you are not you must ask yourself why not. Because you do have a view of the self being conditional. So why isn't that view liberating?
If they are unsatisfactory after removal of inflections then they still are afflicted. Why would anyone want suffering in Nirvana? Unsatisfactory in english means that you don't want or like it. So you would have to not feel good as a buddha.
You are saying all things are impermanent including buddha.
I am not only saying that all things are impermanent including buddha.
I am saying there is not even a 'buddha' that can be pinned down. Buddha is empty.
"And so, Anuradha — when you can't pin down the Tathagata as a truth or reality even in the present life — is it proper for you to declare, 'Friends, the Tathagata — the supreme man, the superlative man, attainer of the superlative attainment — being described, is described otherwise than with these four positions: The Tathagata exists after death, does not exist after death, both does & does not exist after death, neither exists nor does not exist after death'?"
"You, monks, should not thus cultivate the notion (samjna) of impermanence, suffering and non-Self, the notion of impurity and so forth, deeming them to be the true meaning [of the Dharma], as those people [searching in a pool for a radiant gem but foolishly grabbing hold of useless pebbles, mistaken for priceless treasure] did, each thinking that bits of brick, stones, grass and gravel were the jewel. You should train yourselves well in efficacious means. In every situation, constantly meditate upon [bhavana] the idea [samjna] of the Self, the idea of the Eternal, Bliss, and the Pure ... Those who, desirous of attaining Reality [tattva], meditatatively cultivate these ideas, namely, the ideas of the Self [atman], the Eternal, Bliss, and the Pure, will skilfully bring forth the jewel, just like that wise person [who obtained the genuine, priceless gem, rather than worthless detritus misperceived as the real thing.]"
"The Tathagata also teaches, for the sake of all beings, that there is, in truth, the Self in all phenomena" (The Buddha in The Mahaparinirvana Sutra, Chapter Three).
"I am saying there is not even a 'buddha' that can be pinned down. Buddha is empty."
To me that is the definition of uncondtional. Buddha even says nirvana is unconditioned.
Ok... it is unconditioned not in the sense that there is a permanent substance called 'buddha' but rather it is because a Buddha, an Awareness, or whatever... cannot be pinned down or found or located. There is no inherent existence to Buddha, Awareness, etc.
It doesn't mean there is a unconditioned Awareness that is permanent and existing behind conditioned phenomena... that would imply that Awareness is inherent and independent.
Rather, nothing, no phenomena, no self, can be found to be inherent and independent. And it is therefore empty and unconditioned.
"Although interdependence is itself conditioned, in reality it is unborn and empty; its true nature is unconditioned. But this is not an unconditioned reality like Brahma but an unconditioned truth i.e. the fact that all things are in reality empty, unborn, uncreated. "
"The constant presence / abiding of the Tathagata is called 'the Self' [atman]. The Dharmakaya [essential being of the Buddha] is unbounded, unimpeded, neither arising nor perishing, and endowed with the eight masteries / sovereignties [aishvarya - such as being able to project countless mind-endowed forms, to acquire all dharmas, and to pervade all places like space]. This is called 'the Self'."
.....
"When I have taught non-Self, fools uphold the teaching that there is no Self. The wise know that such is conventional speech [vyavahara-vat] and they are free from doubts."
Comments
I don't understand what you mean by the faculty needs a third or fourth faculty to establish it.
It is very simple, the teachings of eighteen dhatus state that the 6 consciousness arises in dependence of the six sense objects and six sense faculties.
For example, when eye and form assumes their right relation, a visual consciousness takes place
Of course, eye and form is also dependent on many conditions but we don't have to go into that.
Arya Nagarjuna:
38. When eye and form assume their right relation,
Appearances appear without a blur.
Since these neither arise nor cease,
They are the dharmadhatu, though they are imagined to be otherwise.
39. When sound and ear assume their right relation,
A consciousness free of thought occurs.
These three are in essence the dharmadhatu, free of other characteristics,
But they become "hearing" when thought of conceptually.
40. Dependent upon the nose and an odor, one smells.
And as with the example of form there is neither arising nor cessation,
But in dependence upon the nose-consciousness’s experience,
The dharmadhatu is thought to be smell.
41. The tongue’s nature is emptiness.
The sphere of taste is voidness as well.
These are in essence the dharmadhatu
And are not the causes of the taste consciousness.
42. The pure body’s essence,
The characteristics of the object touched,
The tactile consciousness free of conditions—
These are called the dharmadhatu.
43. The phenomena that appear to the mental consciousness, the chief of them all,
Are conceptualized and then superimposed.
When this activity is abandoned, phenomena’s lack of self-essence is known.
Knowing this, meditate on the dharmadhatu.
44. And so is all that is seen or heard or smelled,
Tasted, touched, and imagined,
When yogis [and yoginis]* understand these in this manner,
All their wonderful qualities are brought to consummation.
45. Perception’s doors in eyes and ears and nose,
In tongue and body and the mental gate—
All these six are utterly pure.
These consciousnesses’ purity itself is suchness’ defining characteristic.
I haven't read the Buddha Within as I didn't have enough background. My current practice is mainly focused on easing up. Easing up the body and mind. Pema Chodron and Sogyal Rinpoche say that Shunyata is being spacious, easing up, being big and generous about things, and seeing them with new eyes.
I find the Gelug school too intellectual but I will attempt your discussion. I am on a lot of psychiatric medications and I have a mental illness which makes it difficult for me to follow complex conceptualization. I find that just examining an experience with wonder and being simple and undemanding is a better realization than having a blue print.
It is very simple, the teachings of eighteen dhatus state that the 6 consciousness arises in dependence of the six sense objects and six sense faculties.
For example, when eye and form assumes their right relation, a visual consciousness takes place
Of course, eye and form is also dependent on many conditions but we don't have to go into that."
What faculty establishes that the eye consciousness is dependent upon an eye?
In tongue and body and the mental gate—
All these six are utterly pure.
These consciousnesses’ purity itself is suchness’ defining characteristic."
This supports an unconditioned non-composite awareness. Otherwise these six are all impure (dukkha).
Dukkha is not real. The (ungraspable) self is the only reality. Love. Buddha nature. Citta. Bodhicitta.
The sphere of taste is voidness as well.
These are in essence the dharmadhatu
And are not the causes of the taste consciousness."
This also contradicts what you said. The tongue is not the cause of taste consciousness.
you may not be conscious that you are aware.
the second sentence is untrue.
if you are unconscious, you cant be aware.
But then, going to the toilet without the faculty of consciousness can't be done also.
you just cant control it.
That is not a faculty... that is ignorance. Ignorance being the view of things existing independently, inherently, permanently.
If there is wisdom, it is directly seen how every manifestation dependently originates. The entire universe with all its requisite conditions is exerting itself as this moment of experience and action.
For example: stick, drum, action of hitting, air, all these come together... and a new phenomenon of ear consciousness, the act of hearing drumbeats, arise.
The act of hearing drumbeats did not come from the air, did not come from the stick, did not come from the action of hitting. Rather, it is that all these requisite conditions come together, a new and complete phenomenon of 'hearing drumbeat' manifest.
Nothing is created by something else... and nothing exists independently.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn12/sn12.067.than.html
"It's not the case, Kotthita my friend, that consciousness is self-made, that it is other-made, that it is both self-made & other-made, or that — without self-making or other-making — it arises spontaneously. However, from name-&-form as a requisite condition comes consciousness."
(name and form being mental and physical factors)
They are not pure due to being an independent, unchanging substance.
For example you might see something dirty - but the fly sees it as beautiful - and the deva may see something else. Why? That object you think is dirty has no inherent existence. It is empty of 'dirty' characteristic... it is not inherently dirty. It is a dependently originated appearance. As such, it is pure, but it is not pure as contrast to impurity. The purity is simply the absence of impurity... not a contrasting purity.
As Heart Sutra states,
Shariputra, all dharmas are marked with emptiness,
(They) do not appear or disappear,
are not tainted or pure
It 'de-establishes' that there are entities... as there is nothing self-existing on its own, but are merely a dependently originated appearance.
D.O. deconstructs entities into an ungraspable process, activity of interdependent interaction.
A red flower for human is a black flower for dogs is a .... for something else, is 99.999% space for quantum vision, the image dependently originates and no phenomena exists in and of itself. Red flower is red only due to the dependently originated mode of cognition... there is no inherent red flower.
Dukkha means unsatisfactoriness. You can't find satisfaction in things that are empty, without permanence, without essence.
You do not need to establish DO when you see everything as a process of interdependent action... with nothing that can be pinned down as a reality/existence of itself.
For example... you can't pin down 'red flower' as a reality - red flower is apparently red due to various conditions.
If everything dependently originates, there is no 'something' causing 'something'... There is neither agent nor an independent object being created.
Like the red flower... is merely a dependently originated image due to various karmic, biological conditionings, there is no red flower existing in itself, much less a red flower being created by something.
Also, like the drum, act of hitting, air, ear, etc... no source can be pinpointed, rather with all these requisite conditions, a new and complete phenomonon manifest but you cannot say the air made this, or the drum made this. Dependent origination contradicts the notion of an origin, cause, creator, and created.
Thats how we speak english. Your language is inaccesible. I have studied buddhism for 10 years. Even someone who has not studied buddhism at all might not mean an independent object of creation. You don't have to study theory to have insight into reality.
Words.
Again where have I disputed that
Impermanent things are unsatisfactory.
That is not saying that all impermanent things are afflictions.
You can remove afflictions (that is what Buddha did), but even after afflictions are removed, all things still bear the characteristic of unsatisfactoriness.
That is why the Garab Dorje Rinpoche said that, "Even with 5 Wisdoms, the Buddha was unable to find happiness in Samsara."
It certainly does not mean the Buddha was unhappy. It simply means that unsatisfactoriness is a fact of all things impermanent.
You are saying all things are impermanent including buddha.
When insight of anatta arises, it is seen that awareness is simply the seen, heard, smelled. In seeing there is just the seen, no seer. In hearing just the heard, no hearer. Hearing is the heard, seeing is the seen.
And further insights show how awareness, being the seen, heard, smelled, dependently originates.
This is what Nagarjuna is describing... that all consciousnesses dependently originated, and as such are empty, pure, and luminous.
Unsatisfactoriness does not imply things are afflicted.
It just means all things, lacking permanency, cannot be satisfactory.
Afflictions means, there is clinging to things as me and mine, resulting in attachments, suffering, craving, anger, fear, etc. There is delusion of I, of satisfactoriness, of permanence, and as a result there is those afflictions stated.
You can remove afflictions, you cannot remove the fact that things are unsatisfactory.
Nirvana is the end of clinging, suffering, afflictions.
I never said you need to go into a trance of meditate for 50 years. Where did you even get that idea?
I never said awareness was a solid graspable entity. Where did you get that?
I never said you need to go into a trance of meditate for 50 years. Where did you even get that idea?"
If realizing that everything is empty of self is enlightening then you must be enlightened. But you are most likely not.
What I mean by establish is establishing things to have real existence... as nothing can be established to have real existence, nothing can be established.
As for 'who sees', this is a wrong question as it presumes a seer. There is no seer. Seeing happens when requisite conditions are there. There is no agent.
However I did state my experience and insights just as it is here: http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2010/12/my-e-booke-journal.html
I am saying there is not even a 'buddha' that can be pinned down. Buddha is empty.
As Buddha himself said in http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn22/sn22.086.than.html
"And so, Anuradha — when you can't pin down the Tathagata as a truth or reality even in the present life — is it proper for you to declare, 'Friends, the Tathagata — the supreme man, the superlative man, attainer of the superlative attainment — being described, is described otherwise than with these four positions: The Tathagata exists after death, does not exist after death, both does & does not exist after death, neither exists nor does not exist after death'?"
To me that is the definition of uncondtional. Buddha even says nirvana is unconditioned.
I never had a view of a 'self' at all.
A 'self' cannot be pinned down as a reality inside or outside the five skandhas. It cannot be found.
And yes, this is liberating.
Nirvana sutra
It doesn't mean there is a unconditioned Awareness that is permanent and existing behind conditioned phenomena... that would imply that Awareness is inherent and independent.
Rather, nothing, no phenomena, no self, can be found to be inherent and independent. And it is therefore empty and unconditioned.
"Although interdependence is itself conditioned, in reality it is unborn and empty; its true nature is unconditioned. But this is not an unconditioned reality like Brahma but an unconditioned truth i.e. the fact that all things are in reality empty, unborn, uncreated. "
- Archaya Mahayogi Shridhar Rinpoche
.....
"When I have taught non-Self, fools uphold the teaching that there is no Self. The wise know that such is conventional speech [vyavahara-vat] and they are free from doubts."
Mahaparinirvana sutra