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Did the Buddha Teach Non-Duality?
Dakini
Veteran
Did the Buddha teach non-duality? I don't recall seeing teachings on this in the sutras. He did teach equanimity, not being attracted to, or repulsed by things, but to take life calmly. But in Mahayana, there is a radical non-duality doctrine that holds that ultimately there is no right and wrong, there is no bad and good, these things are mere projections of the mind, and are really just different aspects of a unity.
Now, I'm sure the Buddha did not teach that there is no right and wrong, no morality. His teachings are full of Right View/Wrong View, Right Speech/Wrong Speech, etc. Can someone explain where this radical non-duality doctrine comes from? The Buddha behaved impeccably, so I'm sure he didn't subscribe to these later beliefs that Enlightened beings are above "mundane" morality, and can behave as they like, because there is no right and wrong on the "supramundane" level. This has been puzzling me lately. :scratch:
Your perspectives on this would be appreciated.
Now, I'm sure the Buddha did not teach that there is no right and wrong, no morality. His teachings are full of Right View/Wrong View, Right Speech/Wrong Speech, etc. Can someone explain where this radical non-duality doctrine comes from? The Buddha behaved impeccably, so I'm sure he didn't subscribe to these later beliefs that Enlightened beings are above "mundane" morality, and can behave as they like, because there is no right and wrong on the "supramundane" level. This has been puzzling me lately. :scratch:
Your perspectives on this would be appreciated.
0
Comments
As I see it, there is no ultimate right and ultimate wrong. Morally speaking, there is skillful and unskillful (which could be considered right and wrong), but there is no ULTIMATE right or wrong that supersedes all.
Is killing ULTIMATELY wrong in every situation? Well, what about pulling the plug on a brain-dead man's life-saving, yet expensive machinery? Is this ultimately wrong in every way? Depends on your perspective, I suppose. What route leads to the least amount of suffering for everyone? That is the "right" way.
Not very sentimental of Buddha ;0)
It reminds me of when Don Juan saw his nephew get killed. Don Juan was always telling Carlos Castaneda that he could SEE. capital letters see. Don Juan said if he had looked at his nephew being killed with ordinary vision he would have been distraught. But he looked at him with SEEING. I don't understand that but I just relate the stories I have heard from others.
A cow does not eat when eating. It thinks of ME who is hungry and the grass that it wants. And something in between eating the grass. But it is not like that. It is a realization quite high in fact and if it seems boring that means you do not have the realization. Its only intellectual you see if it is boring. If you really see you would be quite freaked out by how things are different from how you operate in your samsaric way.
http://buddhism.about.com/od/theprecepts/a/preceptsintro.htm
Non-duality in Mahayana is specifically based on emptiness (sunyata), which is, in a certain sense, the extension of "not-self" to all things. Everything is contingent upon everything else (emptiness does not mean "nothingness" but rather that things are empty of an independent self-subsisting existence-- it is not nihilism).
Examine any one object, for instance, and you'll find that it depends on a number of causes and conditions in order to come into "being" (and all those causes and conditions depend on causes and conditions as well)-- in short, in order for any one "thing" to exist, it requires the rest of the universe.
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Śūnyatā
There is an important distinction however, in Mahayana. Sunyata is not to be understood as some sort of ultimate essence underlying all of reality (it is not a substitute for atman or Dao, or any kind of "eternalism"). Even emptiness is empty-- there is no "ground of being" as there are in other religious and philosophical traditions. In other words, emptiness is not even to be regarded as some sort of Absolute, because this would be just clinging taken to another level. The "point" is to push oneself out of conceptual thinking altogether.
Between the extremes of nihilism and eternalism is the middle path. Mahayana tradition claims this as when the Buddha taught-- or is at any rate, an extension or elaboration of his teachings emptiness and not-self.
This all sounds very abstract, but when one is able to SEE the world in this way (and train oneself to see in this way), this becomes the basis from which one practices equanimity, and how one lives out the precepts.
As for zazen practice in the Mayayana,
We have no words to praise it fully;
The virtues of perfection such as charity, morality.
And the invocation of the Buddha's name,
Confession and ascetic discipline,
And many other good deeds of merit --
All these issue from the practice of zazen.
Even those who have practiced it for just one sitting
Will see all their evil karma erased;
Nowhere will they find evil paths,
But the Pure Land will be near at hand.
With a reverential heart, if we listen to this truth even once,
And praise it, and gladly embrace it,
We will surely be blessed most infinitely.
But, if we concentrate within
And testify to the truth that Self-Nature is no-nature,
We have really gone beyond foolish talk.
The gate of the oneness of cause and effect is opened;
The path of non-duality and non-trinity runs straight ahead.
To regard the form of no-form as form,
Whether going or returning, we cannot be any place else;
To regard the thought of no-thought as thought;
Whether singing or dancing, we are the voice of the Dharma.
How boundless the cleared sky of samadhi!
How transparent the perfect moonlight of the Fourfold Wisdom!
At this moment, what more need we seek?
As the truth eternally reveals itself,
The very place is the Lotus Land of Purity,
This very body is the body of the Buddha.
Morality such as good and bad are simplifications, and it is right to question them. One of the difficulties in internet communication is that minds which are unready for certain truths are exposed and confused.
For instance, I recognize there is no objective right and wrong, but I teach right and wrong to my children. They need the simple morality to develop skillful patterns, and as they grow and mature, so will their morality mature into skillful and unskillful. Concepts such as right and wrong action are like training wheels to help a person become practiced at riding (acting with skill.)
It reminds me of a teaching I received last week about Picasso. Some folks claim he was a crappy artist, because his paintings do not clearly represent the world, and say that anyone could have done what he did. However, picasso had the ability to clearly represent the world he saw, as evidenced in some of his early work. His expertly crafted hands were the example used.
As artists, like Picasso, we learn to draw circles, perspective, shading and so forth until we gain mastery of the basic "rules"... then as we become proficient, we can cast aside the basics and generate our own vision. The same is true of morality. It works well to get actions rolling in a skillful direction, then we can set them aside as we see we don't need the judgement quality of morality. We act well for wellness sake.
With warmth,
Matt
I am a little foggy on the differences, but I think you make a good argument that the saying all views are negated is a subtle attachment to the process of negation. This is the shentong criticism at least.
Pema Chodron echoes this in her logong mind training book. She says that when you become a child of illusion post meditation... a child seeing that all things are dreamlike... Well then you pull the rug out on yourself again! We pull the rug out of noticing the dreamlike quality of phenomena by examining just who it is who is perceiving.
"The real purpose of this slogan is to pull the rug out from under you in case you think you understood the previous slogan. If you feel proud of yourself because of how you really understood that everything is like a dream, then this slogan is here to challenge that smug certainty. It's saying: "Well, who is this anyway who thinks that they discovered that everything is like a dream?"
"Examine the nature of unborn awareness." Who is this "I"? Where did it some from? Who is the one who realizes anything? Who is it that's aware? The slogan points to the transparency of everything, including our beloved identity, this precious M-E. Who is this ME?
The armor we erect around our hearts causes a lot of misery. But don't be deceived, it's very transparent. The more vivid it gets, the more clearly you see it, the more you realize that this shield - this cocoon - is just made up of thoughts that we churn out and regard as solid. It's not made of iron. The armor is not made out of metal. In fact, it's made out of passing memory.
...If you think this big burden of ego, this big monster cocoon, is something, it isn......"
Even conceptually, what is right for one person is often wrong for another due to personal beliefs based on how each individual wants things to be.
When there is no desire there is no right or wrong or good or bad.
Liberation from desire is liberation from duality is nirvana.
"In Tantrism ... all opposites and contraries are illusory. No distinction is made between good and evil. There is no virtue and there is no vice. ... There is no difference between industry and idleness, pleasure and pain, praise and scorn, honour and dishonour. Tantriks deliberately court situations that invite scorn, blame and ridicule, and expose themselves to odium and abuse. He who is despised, they say, is freed from all attachment. There is neither purity nor impurity, neither clean nor unclean {and therefore] no difference between food and offal, between fruit juice and blood, between vegetable sap and urine... " He says in tantric rituals, foul substances are consumed as proof of Liberation from dualistic distinctions and of an enlightened state of mind.
This is an extreme position. Though one might say right and wrong, morality and immorality are projections of the mind, I think it opens the door to a very slippery slope. Did the Buddha really intend to teach that Enlightened masters are free from morality because morality springs from dualistic thinking?
"Introduction
In the mahayana tradition (1) we experience a sense of gentleness toward
ourselves, and a sense of friendliness to others begins to arise. That
friendliness or compassion is known in Tibetan as nyingje, which
literally means "noble heart." We are willing to commit ourselves to
working with all sentient beings. But before we actually launch into that
project, we first need a lot of training.
The obstacle to becoming a mahayanist is not having enough sympathy
for others and for oneself--that is the basic point. And that problem can
be dealt with by practical training, which is known as lojong practice,
"training the mind." That training gives us a path, a way to work with
our crude and literal and raw and rugged styles, a way to become good
mahayanists. Ignorant or stupid students of the mahayana sometimes think
that they have to glorify themselves; they want to become leaders or
guides. We have a technique or practice for overcoming that problem. That
practice is the development of humility, which is connected with training
the mind.
The basic mahayana vision is to work for the benefit of others and
create a situation that will benefit others. Therefore, you take the
attitude that you are willing to dedicate yourself to others. When you
take that attitude, you begin to realize that others are more important
than yourself. Because of that vision of mahayana, because you adopt that
attitude, and because you actually find that others are more important--
with all three of those together, you develop the mahayana practice of
training the mind................"
"The idea of [that] antidote is that everything is empty, so that you
have nothing to care about. You have an occasional glimpse in your mind
that nothing is existent. And because of the nature of that shunyata
experience, whether anything great or small comes up, nothing really
matters very much. It is like a backslapping joke in which everything is
going to be hoo-ha, yuk-yuk-yuk. Nothing is going to matter very much, so
let it go. All is shunyata, so who cares? You can murder, you can
meditate, you can perform art, you can do all kinds of things--everything
is meditation, whatever you do. But there is something very tricky about
the whole approach. That dwelling on emptiness is a misinterpretation,
called the "poison of shunyata."
Some people say that they do not have to sit and meditate, because
they have always "understood." But that is very tricky. I have been
trying very hard to fight such people. I never trust them at all--unless
they actually sit and practice. You cannot split hairs by saying that you
might be fishing in a Rocky Mountain spring and still meditating away;
you might be driving your Porsche and meditating away; you might be
washing dishes (which is more legitimate in some sense) and meditating
away. That may be a genuine way of doing things, but it still feels very
suspicious."
She has strong dharma connections with Trungpa Rinpoche.
It's just like light and dark, they are naturally light and dark, we only concern ourselves with light as good because we can't see without it. Similarly without wholesome actions and results we suffer (more)! It's still a judgment call, it's still relative, but it has a purpose. Everything the Buddha taught was relative to suffering and the cessation of suffering, including karma being "skillful" or "unskillful". An enlightened mind is beyond "good" and "bad", but still recognizes suffering and its causes and so does nothing to cause suffering.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/bodhi/bps-essay_27.html
In this article, Bhikkhu Bodhi argues that "The teaching of the Buddha as found in the Pali canon does not endorse a philosophy of non-dualism of any variety, nor, I would add, can a non-dualistic perspective be found lying implicit within the Buddha's discourses."
I'm not a fan of non-dualism myself. Denial of the reality of any distinction between "right" and "wrong" (or good/evil, skillful/unskillful, etc.) can too easily be used as justification for all kinds of harmful behavior. Ultimately, for me, Buddhist practice is summed up by the following quote from the Dhammapada: "Do good, avoid evil, and purify the mind."
Alan
These are all straw men in light of my posts.
So when you say an enlightened mind is beyond "good" and "bad," but does nothing to cause suffering, that just doesn't make sense to me. It's the same to me as saying that an enlightened mind is beyond "good" and "bad," but does "good" and avoids that which is "bad."
Alan
http://www2.kenyon.edu/Depts/Religion/Fac/Adler/Reln260/Vimalakirti.htm
In chapter 9 of the Vimalakirti-Sutra there’s a nice part about “the Darma-Door of Nonduality". Vimalakirti keeping his silence is a koan.
With reasoning we don't enter this Dharma-Door.
[Human beings give ‘permanence’ to objects and ideas in the world.
If you hurt your toe, you feel pain for a few hours; in the worldly view. But in the six sense view, you see your mind picking up on the pain, reacting, and then passing on to some other distraction. Every so often the mind returns to the pain, and considers it to have been there all along. It gives permanence to the pain, even though the actual experience is of it intermittent.
You relate to the pain in the toe as if it were there the whole time, but really it only ‘hurts’ when you put conscious attention on it.
This is ‘object permanence’ - a term in psychology. We create a whole world of objects. Wife/husband, house, job, self, identity, car, hobbies …. your whole world is made of objects that you necessarily relate to as ‘real’ and ‘permanent’. In fact, though you don’t think about them in this way, even roads, telephones, time – everything in society, you relate to as being there, being real. Your constructs are the filters of how you relate to the world and your expectations of it.
All this is sensible and necessary. No one could function on a level higher than a simple animal, if we did not create a world in this manner. It is a good thing.
However, the yogi view, watching things arise and cease, paying attention to the impermanent aspect, starts to deconstruct the ‘world’.
The world, the world – how far does this saying go?
What is transitory by nature is called the world in the Ariyan sense. And what is transitory by nature?
The eye, forms, eye consciousness … the ear, sounds, hearing consciousness … [nose, tongue, body] The mind, mind states, mind consciousness are transitory by nature.
Pleasant unpleasant or indifferent feeling which arise from sense contact – that also is transitory by nature.
Samyutta Nikaya, 2nd 50 (Ch IV) ‘Transitory’]
"If, on the other hand, you believe that nothing you can do will reveal the truth and that the best thing to do is to surrender completely to this moment, you will discover Primordial Awareness."
I'm not sure anyone believes that nothing you can do will reveal the truth. Not in my sangha at least or why would we be practicing? I suspect another straw man?
I recommend 'the buddha within' by shenpen hookham if you are serious about learning the shentong position.
So I think #4 is applying to what you said, Alan, regarding the mahayana saying "If, on the other hand, you believe that nothing you can do will reveal the truth and that the best thing to do is to surrender completely to this moment, you will discover Primordial Awareness." In my experience in a mahayana sangha your statement is false, because the teaching is indeed that we can know the truth about this experience. Directly and for ourselves.
I think what's being proposed in the article is that Primordial Awareness cannot be grasped by the mind, but can only be experienced by surrendering our preconceptions and immersing ourselves totally in present moment awareness. This may not accord with your own understanding, but I don't find it surprising that even among Buddhist non-dualists, that perspectives can vary.
Alan
In the mahayana the Mind is clear, luminous, and unimpeded. This is the exact opposite of not knowing.
You could say that bodhicitta is not DEADENED by THINKING that you know. Thinking is not knowing. You can be a 'know it all' which means you think you know, but do not.
Another way of thinking of this is to analyze what is the present? If we say it is now then the minute we say that the present is gone. If we say the future exists, no it is only a thought. The past is a memory. The present is a moment that can be divided in two and since it can always be divided there is never any present moment.
This is the reality we KNOW if we examine our own meditation experience. This is the only game in town; here is our awareness.
From your posts I don't think you understand non-dualism. Based on what you have said. I am studying in the lineage of Gampopa. Non-dualism is an experience in the space of awareness. It is not 'it'. Its the same awareness before and after. Just after there is no defense of layers of conditioned memories which construct 'me'.