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emptiness creates illusion?
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Someone with this level of insecurity has not entered very deeply into Jhana and cannot be trusted to translate the meaning of the Suttas.
Because you have not seen your own past lives as clearly as I see you here, you doubt, only due to your bondage, encased by the 5 senses.
Not only does the sutta not include the term "transmigrate", it does not include the term "repeatedly".
It simply states: "Long have you cried over the death of a mother, father, etc".
It ends by stating: But it seems we are yet disenchanted and dispassionate.
To the contrary, we appear to crave to endlessly experience this samsara.
With metta
DD
LOL
Obviously it is a metaphor for transmigration.
Try sticking to the topic and abstain from your mind's Freudian imaginings.
:-/
Myself, I am merely engaged in a Dhamma discussion.
Bhikkhu Bodhi, despite sharing similar superstitions to you, translates this correctly. So do others such as Patrick Kearney. Neither use the word "transmigration".
I do not to justify myself. I have already advised you the Pali means to "run".
The same term is used in the MN for the galloping of a horse.
The Buddha himself simply used interdependent origination do describe a stream of mental conditioning that leads to suffering. The stream can occur many times in one day.
But you seem to be asserting a continuous stream back to before the big bang and before that.
This discussion was about emptiness but for some reason you can to bring up the imagined mind stream, atman or "true self" of reincarnation.
Come on now?
:wow:
How can atman, unchanging and independent, be a 'stream'?
When I say folks are voicing "unverified superstitions", that is true.
When there is craving to be, craving for external existence, it does not really matter what the thing craved for is called.
The craving is the same. The realisation of emptiness is not there. Just craving.
And hence nothing arise from a creator, an uncaused first cause - there can be no uncreated creator or beginning.
But then, it is not a metaphor as you asserted.
The only metaphor in that sutta is sheding tears greater than the ocean
:bawl:
:mullet:
If you watch Daniel Ingram's video, his psycho-babble will give you a good idea about how the mind just spins & runs in excited circles.
This is samsara.
The Buddha never encouraged any of his monks to declare things like they have seen their "past lives" because some listeners would regard them as liars & charlatans.
Why? Because it is something the listeners cannot verify. They must believe blindly.
The Buddha himself said such behaviour he finds "disgusting".
But now "you" will start alleging the Buddha was insulting "you".
When I say you are on the wrong path with your constant declarations, this is not an insult but genuine concern.
:coffee:
Anyway... There is a difference between not being able to physically verify something in the moment due to the medium of communication and completely denying that it is a possible fact of life.
You seem to follow the ladder, denying every translation but those that follow your way of thinking? You should be more agnostic and not insult others so endlessly for possibly having a level of experience that far exceeds your own self esteemed state.
I've noticed though, there is no debating this point with you as you will always turn it into the other persons fault. You will never humble down and agree that, "I do not know?" You are too secure in your insecurity, too certain of your uncertainty.
..........
THREE WORDS STRIKING THE ESSENCE
BY
RIG'DZIN GA'RAB DORJE
WITH A BRIEF COMMENTARY BY KYABJE DÜD'JOM RINPOCHE, 'JIGDRÄL YESHE DORJE
Directly meeting with one's own nature
This fresh and present awareness beyond all consideration of the three times, is, in itself, the primordial awakenedness that is spontaneously present pure awareness. Such is direct introduction to one's own nature.
Directly make one single decision
Since all phenomenal appearance of both cyclic existence and the state beyond suffering do not go beyond the innate creativity of pure awareness, firmly decide that there is no other thing besides the continuous flow of this pure awareness .
Have confidence in direct liberation–dissolution
Whatever discursive thoughts arise, be they gross or subtle, by recognising them for what they are, they all arise and simultaneously dissolve into the vast expanse of the dimension of pure reality — awareness–voidness inseparable. Remain confident in this liberation.
(m94)
.
"This is how he attends inappropriately: Where has this being come from? Where is it bound?'( What is the original cause of ignorance, where does it come from to begin with)
This is called a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views. Bound by a fetter of views, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person is not freed from birth, aging, & death, from sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair. He is not freed, I tell you, from suffering & stress.
"The well-instructed disciple of the noble ones... discerns what ideas are fit for attention, and what ideas are unfit for attention. This being so, he does not attend to ideas unfit for attention, and attends [instead] to ideas fit for attention... He attends appropriately, This is stress... This is the origination of stress... This is the cessation of stress... This is the way leading to the cessation of stress. As he attends appropriately in this way, three fetters are abandoned in him: identity-view, doubt, and grasping at precepts & practices."
It seems personal arguments and personal attacks ran rampant during the night because no one has a sense of restraint. If those same personal arguments and personal attacks rear their ugly heads again, they'll be deleted. Please direct your conversations toward the end of answering the OP and with the intent of being helpful, rather than belittling each other.
Once you see the answer to what, why is not so important.
The Buddha when asked of such questions called them imponderable.
Asking why emptiness is empty or why emptiness=form is asking why reality is the way it is.
Zen embraces uncertainty. It does not obsess over it.
Xabir - Good blog page on emptiness. Thanks
Think I'll repost it as it may have gotten lost in the drama.
http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2009/03/on-anatta-emptiness-and-spontaneous.html
Kudos to him for such patient sagacity.
Had I been in his place, this thread would have been half the length it is, because I would have just deleted with no warning or admonishment.
Consider yourselves ALL EXTREMELY fortunate that Cloud touched on this before I saw it.
Thanks, @Cloud.
you think you read (subject=I) and upekka's post (object)
this is the duality
you are deluded with the illusion of a thing, in this case 'upekka's post'
why you are deluded? [wron view]
you think 'upekka's post' has inherent existence
and you have inherent existence
but
what exactly happens is 'eye (internal sense base) + upekka's post (external sense base + eye conscioussness' come together and there is 'seeing' which has no subject or object [right view]
as soon as you finied reading 'upekka's post' is in the past
unless you read it again or recall back it in your mind, it is no more in your world
writing in the'upekka's post' is the form that the eye contacts
but
you take 'upekka's post' which is a perception that has inherent existence
this perception is the illusion
because of you do not know that is an illusion, you are deluded and your fabrication started (this is called cethana, vacci sankhara)
and
you start to think, or say or do (this is called kamma created with thought, speech and deed)
if we are not deluded, we do not fabricate (create kamma), then we ....
you asked me why and i sat on your whys for a while.
the answer i found was simply love. i know that isn't a satisfying intellectual answer.
but when you realize that love is the cause and effect of everything, even if we don't "agree" that results in a deep acceptance of the great mystery of the infinite.
love is the answer you are looking for. not your or anyone elses idea of love. but the love that cannot be put into words. the love that burns everything away until we are left with a clear spaciousness that welcomes everything in the world. the good and the bad. the love that transforms us into whole beings and into what we always were. it is the reason and purpose and function of all of this.
hope you find that love within you. that seed that will bring your freedom and joy.