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New thoughts on death and rebirth
Talisman
Veteran
(Just as a forward, I do not want this to be a "Rebrith vs. no-rebirth thread, take your arguments to another convo. This is a long post, but I hope you find it insightful.)
I had some pretty mindblowing insights this weekend regarding these topics.
One of the difficulties I had in my original understanding of rebirth, was how death could condition birth. It seemed to me that since death appears to immediately precede the process of rebirth, that one's death conditions the process of the reformation of the aggregates and rebirth of consciousness. This is counterintuitive considering the process of dependent origination states that birth conditions old age and death, not the other way around.
Another difficulty I had was understanding how a process of continuity could be perceived between the consciousnes of this life and the consciousness of the next. The frequent analogy used is that of a candle flame, where one candle lights the other. But this analogy demands a process of direct transferrance, which does not seem to make sense since "I," personally, have no contact with this future incarnation of my conscousness since this future incarnation does not exist until after the current incarnation has met its end.
I have determined that the biggest roadblock in my understanding of this process is the reification of this "moment" where death occurs, and after which rebirth occurs. It's like I have this concept of a cliff waiting at the end of my days, and that once I have jumped over this cliff, my next life will begin.
While contemplating these things, with no direct purpose except to roll ideas around in my head while driving, I was suddenly and completely floored by a totally new understanding of these processes and more.
First of all, death does not condition rebirth. This is a statement that many "non-rebirthers" like to advocate, that rebirth is a living process, which is definitely the case when it comes to moment by moment change and alteration of consciousness in this very life. But also, this "living process" occuring right now, RIGHT NOW, is conditioning a future birth of aggregates, the quality of which will be determined by the thoughts, actions, and spoken words being committed in this moment and in this life.
Initially, I had imagined that the karma we produce would be "stored up" somehow and then would simply sprout, as it were, like a seed waiting in the earth until spring arrives to blossom and grow. So in the context of rebirth, the karma that is not yet ripe for fruition in this life would be weighed up and used for determining the quality and conditons of the next life or the next, etc. This kind of simplistic view of things has problems because it reifies the concept of a karma "seed" and a karma "fruit." Also, it leaves the questions, "where are these seeds held?" and "what, if anything, determines the proper frutiion of any particular seed?"
I frequently asked, "why is there a delay?" "Why must the seed sewn now, wait for tomorrow to grow?" If I make an action now, the result should occur now. There is no reason or purpose for an effect to be witheld for any future condition. This goes back to the "candle" analogy that my actions should have contact with my effect. If conditions beyond the actions I have made are necessary for fruition of karma I have created, then how can it be said that my karma conditions the fruition at all. It is only a "partial condition."
It was in a moment of sudden clarity that the answer to this conundrum was revealed.
First of all, there is no delay. My karma now, creates change instantly in my self (nama-rupa not abiding self) and in my environment. This change is not to be reified; it is less than momentary, as it works as yet another conditon for new changes to occur.
Furthermore, the seeds of karma that are created by my actions, words, and thoughts are not seperate from their fruition, just like how the seed sewn is not seperate from the flower it produces. By the process of causality, the karma is inseperable from its fruition. In this way the cause has direct contact with the effect because the cause is transformed into the effect. With the candle analogy the fire of candle A is tranformed into the fire of candle B by the process of instant causality.
This brings us to the topic at hand, the process of Rebirth. And I mean rebirth in a future incarnation, conditoned by the consciousness of the current and prior incarnations, not rebirth from moment to moment.
In my moment of clarity I envisioned myself as the process responsible for conditioning. Specifically I imagined myself walking along a path where no beginning could be assertained but ended in a future birth conditioned by my karma. Every action that I make acts as a condition for altering the future birth. I imagined "lines of causality" stretching from my place on the path into the future. These lines of causality were purely for the purpose of visualizing the process not an actual "thing." With this view, the question of how the seeds of karma are stored or who/what determines the state of their fruition is moot since conditions for my future birth are immediately manifest in the actions I take. There is no delay. This maintained process, that I envisioned, is Bhava, Becoming, the condition for birth according to dependent origination.
Although prior karma can act as an initial conditon effecting the future rebirth, the only central focus of this imagery is "the process responsible for conditoning," specifically me at my current position on the path. I cannot change seeds produced prior to my current position, but seeds produced from my current position continue to effect the future birth. It is in this sense of direct causality that I can say that the future birth is "my" birth, in the same way that I can take ownership of conditions producing this birth as "my karma."
My death in this life is inescapable. With the dissolving of the elements, the clinging aggregates (including consciousness) that constitute my illusory sense of self will crumble and dissolve as well. When this occurs, the lines of causality will continue not from my point on the path, but instead at the point where the effects of prior conditioning meet their fruition (the future birth.) The state of becoming will continue. The only escape from renewed birth and its effects (old age and death) is to cut off the lines of causality at their source, "the process responsible for conditoning," the very state of Becoming.
This way of looking at things does away with any necessity for reifying an abiding, transmigratory "self," or for any transmigration of any of the aggregates including consciousness. Obviously questions still remain, especially when this information is looked at in the context of purposeful rebirth such as in regards to the vows of the Boddhisattva, but those are all quandaries for future contemplation.
Tell me what you think :om:
I had some pretty mindblowing insights this weekend regarding these topics.
One of the difficulties I had in my original understanding of rebirth, was how death could condition birth. It seemed to me that since death appears to immediately precede the process of rebirth, that one's death conditions the process of the reformation of the aggregates and rebirth of consciousness. This is counterintuitive considering the process of dependent origination states that birth conditions old age and death, not the other way around.
Another difficulty I had was understanding how a process of continuity could be perceived between the consciousnes of this life and the consciousness of the next. The frequent analogy used is that of a candle flame, where one candle lights the other. But this analogy demands a process of direct transferrance, which does not seem to make sense since "I," personally, have no contact with this future incarnation of my conscousness since this future incarnation does not exist until after the current incarnation has met its end.
I have determined that the biggest roadblock in my understanding of this process is the reification of this "moment" where death occurs, and after which rebirth occurs. It's like I have this concept of a cliff waiting at the end of my days, and that once I have jumped over this cliff, my next life will begin.
While contemplating these things, with no direct purpose except to roll ideas around in my head while driving, I was suddenly and completely floored by a totally new understanding of these processes and more.
First of all, death does not condition rebirth. This is a statement that many "non-rebirthers" like to advocate, that rebirth is a living process, which is definitely the case when it comes to moment by moment change and alteration of consciousness in this very life. But also, this "living process" occuring right now, RIGHT NOW, is conditioning a future birth of aggregates, the quality of which will be determined by the thoughts, actions, and spoken words being committed in this moment and in this life.
Initially, I had imagined that the karma we produce would be "stored up" somehow and then would simply sprout, as it were, like a seed waiting in the earth until spring arrives to blossom and grow. So in the context of rebirth, the karma that is not yet ripe for fruition in this life would be weighed up and used for determining the quality and conditons of the next life or the next, etc. This kind of simplistic view of things has problems because it reifies the concept of a karma "seed" and a karma "fruit." Also, it leaves the questions, "where are these seeds held?" and "what, if anything, determines the proper frutiion of any particular seed?"
I frequently asked, "why is there a delay?" "Why must the seed sewn now, wait for tomorrow to grow?" If I make an action now, the result should occur now. There is no reason or purpose for an effect to be witheld for any future condition. This goes back to the "candle" analogy that my actions should have contact with my effect. If conditions beyond the actions I have made are necessary for fruition of karma I have created, then how can it be said that my karma conditions the fruition at all. It is only a "partial condition."
It was in a moment of sudden clarity that the answer to this conundrum was revealed.
First of all, there is no delay. My karma now, creates change instantly in my self (nama-rupa not abiding self) and in my environment. This change is not to be reified; it is less than momentary, as it works as yet another conditon for new changes to occur.
Furthermore, the seeds of karma that are created by my actions, words, and thoughts are not seperate from their fruition, just like how the seed sewn is not seperate from the flower it produces. By the process of causality, the karma is inseperable from its fruition. In this way the cause has direct contact with the effect because the cause is transformed into the effect. With the candle analogy the fire of candle A is tranformed into the fire of candle B by the process of instant causality.
This brings us to the topic at hand, the process of Rebirth. And I mean rebirth in a future incarnation, conditoned by the consciousness of the current and prior incarnations, not rebirth from moment to moment.
In my moment of clarity I envisioned myself as the process responsible for conditioning. Specifically I imagined myself walking along a path where no beginning could be assertained but ended in a future birth conditioned by my karma. Every action that I make acts as a condition for altering the future birth. I imagined "lines of causality" stretching from my place on the path into the future. These lines of causality were purely for the purpose of visualizing the process not an actual "thing." With this view, the question of how the seeds of karma are stored or who/what determines the state of their fruition is moot since conditions for my future birth are immediately manifest in the actions I take. There is no delay. This maintained process, that I envisioned, is Bhava, Becoming, the condition for birth according to dependent origination.
Although prior karma can act as an initial conditon effecting the future rebirth, the only central focus of this imagery is "the process responsible for conditoning," specifically me at my current position on the path. I cannot change seeds produced prior to my current position, but seeds produced from my current position continue to effect the future birth. It is in this sense of direct causality that I can say that the future birth is "my" birth, in the same way that I can take ownership of conditions producing this birth as "my karma."
My death in this life is inescapable. With the dissolving of the elements, the clinging aggregates (including consciousness) that constitute my illusory sense of self will crumble and dissolve as well. When this occurs, the lines of causality will continue not from my point on the path, but instead at the point where the effects of prior conditioning meet their fruition (the future birth.) The state of becoming will continue. The only escape from renewed birth and its effects (old age and death) is to cut off the lines of causality at their source, "the process responsible for conditoning," the very state of Becoming.
This way of looking at things does away with any necessity for reifying an abiding, transmigratory "self," or for any transmigration of any of the aggregates including consciousness. Obviously questions still remain, especially when this information is looked at in the context of purposeful rebirth such as in regards to the vows of the Boddhisattva, but those are all quandaries for future contemplation.
Tell me what you think :om:
0
Comments
I put a lot of time into writing this wall of text. lol What does "yup" mean?
regards
meaning that you've encapsulated the concepts so comprehensively, that more words are superfluous.
I reckon you've actually got something here, and may have cracked the code.
Yup.
If you don't reify death and rebirth but see it all as process, then that's it. Yup.
(Edit after rereading your question to me- lol from me too.)
Any other time, they'd sound like fools.
:wave:
Thus means that we don't have to do handwaving to have a 'material' transmit things. Subtle essence or what not. You can say its a subtle essence and the teachers may be correct but we don't know what they mean, just from words.
This is why I make a point of stating that the only point of focus in this visualization of the process of rebirth is "the process responsible for condtitioning" which is the present, current state of becoming. The present determines the conditions for future manifestation. It doesnt matter if this "future manifestation" take place in a time or place distant from or near to our current time and place.
No, it doesn't really matter. One doesn't need to sit around and think about whether or not time is linear concerning future rebirth-- what will happen will happen.
Though, it is sometimes fun to sit around and think about these things, and sometimes one can't help it.
http://www.buddhism-connect.org/sanghaspace-members/teachings/
Example:
Student:
"Consciousness itself must be causative otherwise it would not pass from life to life."
Lama Shenpen:
How could consciousness in the way we usually understand it pass from life to life anyway?
If it were something that was a stream of moments of consciousness, then all the past ones have died when we die and how could we say the new ones were us in any way?
What kind of continuity could it be that could pass from where we are now into a mother’s womb somewhere else?
Just think about it - it doesn’t make any sense.
But then consciousness doesn’t make sense anyway - not even now, not even from moment to moment.
If it were moments of consciousness then how would they join up to form sentences and words and meaning?
By the time the first part of the sentence is finished it would have gone and so we couldn’t be conscious of it in order to be conscious of the whole sentence and its meaning.
This is something that we need to contemplate and meditate on again and again in a gentle way - gently nudging our understanding along.
Consciousness is not as we think it is ... so how is it actually when we home in on it meditatively - not speculating and theorising but just homing in on what we are really experiencing.
We experience meaning and the meaning is not in time or space.
It’s not in the body or outside it - keep looking!
Keep looking - resting meditatively for a long time - again and again - just let go into that place of looking again and again.
Student:
"If the universe is deterministic, then we are all enmeshed in a web of causality so there is no point grasping at anything or pushing anything away."
Lama Shenpen:
And there is no reason to care about anything either.
Why get up in the morning?
Nothing matters.
There is no heart in such a view of life - life is driven by passion!
Student:
"Neither can we blame anyone for the way they act towards us.
So we can just relax and let life unfold in its own way."
Lama Shenpen:
Well it’s good not to blame others and to relax and let life unfold in its own way - that is maybe a bit too simple for us right now.
It would be a great spiritual accomplishment to be able to be like that.
We are too confused right now to be that simple, that is the trouble.
Even when we try to relax and think of letting things be we get too theoretical about it and find we are holding on to all sorts of hidden assumptions that make our so called relaxation and letting be a lie.
Nevertheless it’s the only way forward - to keep trying to discover how to be like that.
Student:
"That seems rather comforting to me."
Lama Shenpen:
Yes I think it feels intuitively right doesn’t it?
Even if we are not really there yet.
Student:
"On the other hand, If I do have free will, then who am 'I' that exists independent of this web?"
Lama Shenpen:
A Buddha perhaps - that would be a shock to the system wouldnt it!!!!!!
Well to understand what that meant even would be something I guess!
Student:
"Thanks for a wonderful course – it’s really changed my life and I'm very grateful."
Lama Shenpen:
Thank you for telling me that and for these difficult questions!
They are very important and in some ways obvious questions but sometimes it’s really difficult to spot the obvious questions so I am pleased to have this opportunity to focus on them. .
To be honest, I'm not sure how these quotes relate to my OP or to your post about time being a construct and connections being "outside of time." To suggest that something could be "outside of time" would be asserting an immutable entity, which is impossible, since an immutable entity cannot interact with an impermanent universe.
Time and space constitute a single phenomena according to Eisteins's general theory of relativity. Time is not a "thing" or a "space" or a "construct." Time is a measurement. It is used for discussing phenomena in relative terms. Time is not seperate from space or any other phenomena. This is the nature of interdependence.
You don't understand what is meant by outside of time. Because it wouldn't imply something is immutable. In our experience nothing is immutable. So she cannot be meaning that. She is saying something about our experience. Not about a theory of Einstein. She is saying something about your experience which you have right now.
Here is what she said:
"Just think about it - it doesn’t make any sense.
But then consciousness doesn’t make sense anyway - not even now, not even from moment to moment.
If it were moments of consciousness then how would they join up to form sentences and words and meaning?
By the time the first part of the sentence is finished it would have gone and so we couldn’t be conscious of it in order to be conscious of the whole sentence and its meaning.
This is something that we need to contemplate and meditate on again and again in a gentle way - gently nudging our understanding along.
Consciousness is not as we think it is ... so how is it actually when we home in on it meditatively - not speculating and theorising but just homing in on what we are really experiencing.
We experience meaning and the meaning is not in time or space.
It’s not in the body or outside it - keep looking!
Keep looking - resting meditatively for a long time - again and again - just let go into that place of looking again and again."
Such notions as a magical body are uneccessary if you stick to your experience instead of theorizing.
I don't understand what he means by "consciousness." The only ways I've seen consciusness described by the Buddha is as the 3rd link of dependent origination and as 1 of the 5 aggregates, and as part of the sense-spheres.
The first and second, is the function to discern. As in, formations give rise to the function to discern. Perceiving this as this and that as that.
This ties into the third description, there is eye-consciousness, discerning forms. There is ear-consciusness, discerning sound. Etc.
The reason I say that something "outside of time" would be immutable is because it would be unchanging. Time is a measurement of change in any given system or phenomena. That which is unchanging cannot effect or be effected by that which is changing.
What I'm trying to state in my OP is that there is no "magical body which carries the karma." That's what I was trying to refute. As I continue to explain, there is no necessity for any transmigration at all in order to recognize a continuity through causation.
By consciousness that is not a technical term. It refers to your awareness. At the level of my lamas teaching she is talking about consciousness as you experience consciousness. (as I understand at least). I think as you divorce yourself from your experience and get lost in concepts you can end up just 'counting grains of sand'. You would have to ask her if you were needing to know how this teaching relates to a given sutra from the buddha.
it might be a problem of my basis coming from the yogacara school.. I am sorry but I am not educated enough to bridge the gap, but the yogacara the awareness is not conditional it is unconditioned...
So the quotations may not be helpful for you right now.
But we can still puzzle together how the karma gets into the womb
This birth is conditioned by the state of becoming. The state of becoming is conditioned by clinging to sensual pleasures, wrong views, ritual and superstition, and an abiding self. Clinging is conditioned by craving. Craving is conditioned by Sensation. Sensation is conditioned by contact. Contact is conditioned by the pressence of the 6 sense gates. The senses are conditioned by namarupa (nama=feeling, perception, intention, contact, and attention // rupa=the 4 great elements and the form dependent on the 4 great elements.) Namarupa is conditioned by counsciousness (the function to discern.) Consciusness is condtioned by formations (verbal, mental, and physical)(also, consciousness is described as conditined by namarupa.) The formations are conditioned by Ignorance.
There is no "reborn." There is "birth" conditioned by "becoming."
It seems like you are addressing 'birth' in the context of the 12 dependent links but you are not addressing. 'talisman dies and becomes a goat. Or talisman dies and becomes a deva. Or talisman dies and becomes a fetus.
birth in the 12 dependent links doesn't refer to pushing out a baby as far as I know.
What you are saying I think is correct by the way. I am just trying to think of how you understand the notion of 'Talisman' at all. You don't think you are a goat now I assume? So say hypothetically that you become a newborn goat in egypt when you die. How does the eye consciousness which you are now experiencing looking at this computer screen get 'into' the goat and become its eye consciousness?
It can't be physics because there are no particles moving between you and egypt in enough of an organized fashion to convey your state of becoming to the donkey.
What do you mean, "projection of mind?" This is what is meant by "causality."
"'From the arising of this comes the arising of that.
"'When this isn't, that isn't.
"'From the cessation of this comes the cessation of that.
He is not speaking of phenomena in general...
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn12/sn12.061.than.html
There. It's a quick read. I think I used the quote in proper context. He does appear to be speaking of all phenomena, since he mentions the 4 great elements and the mind.
How do things come into existence? They are the effect of a cause. How did the pen come into existence? Could the pen come from itself? Do pens multiply by itself? Is it not from something else. Things no not happen for no reason!
Is the pen an effect of its cause? No.
But But if something happens then it has to have a cause.
Are effects the same as causes? How can an effect be the same as a cause? If they were the same, how could you distinguish between a cause and an effect. So are causes and effect the same or are they different. Well they have to be different.
If the result was the same as the cause, why would you need a cause? It would already be there.
The cause and effect of a pen. Various materials (cause) are made into an effect (pen).
How can one thing bring about another?
How can an orange bring about an apple?
If they are different (inherently), how can one thing turn into another? How can plastic turn into a pen? Plastic is always plastic.
If cause and effect is different, then which came first the cause or the effect? Well obviously the cause comes before the effect.
Is a cause a cause before the effect comes about? No. The cause is not a cause until the effect of the cause occurs. So which comes first the cause or effect?
Does the effect come about as the same time as the cause? No. We went over this. We couldn't tell them apart then.
When you have an effect, where is it's cause? The cause is gone.
In what sense does the cause bring about the effect, when the cause isn’t there when the effect comes along? Cause and effect is impossible.
-----------------------------
so basically cause/effect is merely a projection from the mind onto the non dual reality. only in the mind do we create the connection between cause/effect and thus project onto reality.
you can use this same formula to break down the body, mind, or really anything. the purpose of this is to realize our inherent assumptions of the tools we use aka our mind. thus realizing the non dual emptiness.
The 12 dependent links deal with conditional phenomena. The nature of mind is an UNconditioned thing. MIND is what is involved in reincarnation.
An example of something unconditioned is nirvana. Otherwise there would be an impermanent nirvana with dukkha.
How is the "mind" unconditioned? This is pantamount to stating that there is an abiding impermanent self. We change our minds all the time!
All conditioned phenomena are dukkha.
and consciousness is empty like everything else.