Is there a treatise or line of thought justifying the existence of the Unconditioned?
Tor
California New
I am new to the practice and it was easy to buy into the idea that our reality is conditioned. But the Unconditioned? There seems to be an absence of teaching that helps the learner arrive at an easy, logical conclusion that since the Conditioned exists, that there must also be an Unconditioned. I personally am taking it on faith right now, and before Buddhism I thought of the Unconditioned as the "place" to where I would transcend spiritually, so it was also easy to replace my own notions with the word "unconditioned".
For example, a nihilist could probably accept that our world is conditioned, but in the absence of faith, what teachings exist that could convince the nihilist that the Unconditioned is worthy of consideration??? Have I missed a key teaching?
Comments
Here we can see the difference between the conditioned and the unconditioned. Here to help!
You might be interested in this.
The unconditioned is not the mind but it does refer to the mind that is not conditioned by emotions & thoughts.
A simple example is pure water. The pure water is not conditioned by impurities, such as dirt, colour, flavours, etc..
The term "Unconditioned" refers to the quality of the water rather than to the water itself.
Similarly, as the mind has the nature to know & experience, when the Mind is free from emotions & thoughts, experiencing this is experiencing the Unconditioned.
This quote from Ajahn Chah might be helpful in Chapter 4 of ''The Island - An Anthology of the Buddha's Teachings on Nibbana'' by Ajahn Pasano and Ajahn Amaro
"The Buddha talked about sankhata dhammas and asankhata dhammas - conditioned and unconditioned things. Conditioned things are innumerable - material or immaterial, big or small - if our mind is under the influence of delusion, it will proliferate about these things, dividing them up into good and bad, short and long, coarse and refined.
Why does the mind proliferate like this ? Because it doesn't know conventional determinate reality, it doesn't know about conditions. Not knowing these things, the mind doesn't see the Dhamma. Not seeing the Dhamma, the mind is full of clinging. As long as the mind is held down by clinging, there can be no escape from the conditioned world....
Asankhata dhamma, the unconditioned, refers to the mind that has seen the Dhamma, the truth of the five khandhas as they are - as transient, imperfect and ownerless. All ideas of 'me' and 'mine', 'them' and 'theirs' belong to the determined reality. Really they are all conditions.
When we let go of conditions we attain the Dhamma, we enter into and realise the Dhamma."
Also, here.
It might be more a skillful means. Nagarjuna himself was critical of taking positions. The unconditioned is more a shentong position and a lot of people like the Gelug school takes the emptiness of self (rangtong) say that everything is conditioned though they will say that Nirvana is unconditioned and I forget their reasoning of their viewpoint but they do have reasoning.
Would you be interested in the Tibetan Buddhists analysis of the unconditioned? If so it is out there (scripture) and you can find it.
But Nagarjuna was critical of both the shentong (emptiness of other -hard to translate) and rangtong (emptiness of self) even though he (Nagarjuna) is famous for laying down the reasoning to the madhymaka analysis which both shentong and rangtong incorporate.
I believe his (Nagarjuna) criticism of the rangtong is that emptiness of self almost presumes that there is a self to be negated. So it is like saying there is a sense or position of negation. And Nagarjunas criticism of shentong was to say that how do we establish an unconditioned if we cannot even establish a conditioned.
But back to the unconditioned it is a skillful means. Nobody can prove your Buddhanature because it's like proving a snowman 'no that's a snowball...no that's a carrot'. So is there a Buddhanature?
For sutras relating to the Buddhanature how about the shrimaladevi sutra or the ratnagotravhibaga?
Personally I have in the past found it useful to reflect on mankind's natural state. In a way you could argue that the unconditioned is that natural state, unpolluted by conditioning that gets applied.
My thinking is that there are several layers, there is a primitive natural path of growth for example. If you think of mankind without language, we would be much closer to apes, but like gorillas we would still have social groups, some hierarchy, mating, food gathering, searching for shelter and play. At this level there is already social conditioning and conditioning applied by the nature of the world.
Then there is a layer which is the hunter-gatherer path, this is mankind with language and oral tradition but no written language or complex memes. There is complex communication and some kinds of belief, but the volume of material that can be taught and which functions as conditioning is small compared to modern man.
Then there is agricultural man, with a written language and complex memes and beliefs which evolve over thousands of years. There is more learning and correspondingly more conditioning.
Then there is media man, who swims in several technology-driven media awash with complex, ever changing meme content. Conditioning is a process that is continuously ongoing, learning never stops.
All this of course is separate from the Buddhist concept, which is man shorn of all worldly conditioning which keeps us in samsara.
Nihilists may be convinced experientially as they find the conditional starts to dissipate. In other words Buddhist practice verifies itself.
The part of the mind shampoo that you have missed is enlightenment.
Time for your rinse? 
Interesting, Jeffrey. There is a similar debate in Theravada, where the unconditioned is viewed by some as an existing reality which one "connects" with, and by others just as a state of mind, one unconditioned by craving, aversion and delusion.
A couple of relevant suttas: http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/ud/ud.8.03.than.html
https://suttacentral.net/en/an3.47
@Tor
Here the mind can become a snake trying to swallow it's own tail.
The difference between the conditioned and the unconditioned can most easily be found
by examining what seeks to rationalize both states and what doesn't.
While it is understandable to rely on our conditioned mental reflexes to try to make sense of the unconditioned, to the degree that we can meditatively transcend our reliance on those conditioned mental reflexes, turns out to be the only degree to which the unconditioned can actually be experienced.