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Not everyone agrees with everything that Xabir says. I actually disagree on some very important, though seemingly subtle points.
Yet, I do enjoy an amicable discussion on these points, especially with someone who is both serious and learned, not to mention gentle and well meaning. : ^ )
This is not so common as one might wish.
And:
This also gives us all a chance to reexamine what we think we know, and just possibly don’t.
Friends need not agree on every point.
But still, we are glad to see a friend any old time.
X: In Buddhism, reality is like a dream but not dream. All sensations are clearly present, not a dream at all, but are at the same time impermanent, dependently originated, ungraspable - so it is LIKE a dream, but not a dream. There is a clear difference there.
S9: Are you under the opinion that in a dream things/thoughts are not impermanent, or not co-dependent, or not ungraspable?
No of course not. : ^ )
I think that you would have to agree that a thought when awake or when dreaming is still just a thought. That all thoughts, not matter the time of day, or the circumstance of their appearance are impermanent, codependent, and ungraspable, and that this efficiently describes the nature of thought, awake or sleeping.
Mind is thought, and thought is mind. These are two names for the same exact thing.
Thoughts are in the mind similar to the way that clouds are in the sky. Mind allows thoughts, and the sky allows clouds. But you cannot simply reverse this and say that clouds allow the sky, or that thoughts allow the mind, because they are not equal in this way, and besides this it would not be accurate.
Q: Look, there is a reality out there. There is something present that doesn't just vanish when you approach it.
S9: Perhaps this is because you are approaching mind objects from within the mind. Step outside of the more limited mind, and then what do you witness? Does the dream continue when you wake up as Buddha says he did? Does hypnosis continue after the hypnotist clicks his fingers? Mind has us hypnotized.
Q: Now what is present is ungraspable but it is not a nothingness.
S9: Looked at in this way, nothingness would certainly just be conceptual. But is it possible that there is a dimension of understanding beyond what mind is constantly asserting? Many have said there is, and not only that but they have witnessed this personally.
Q: Like take a mirage for instance. That is a perfect example of an actual illusion.
S9: No a mirage is an example of an illusion, within an illusion. A mirage isn’t really a lake, but it is really a mirage. Yet both of these are just two ways in which the eye perceives one mind object/event.
When you fall asleep at night, this whole present world simply falls away, just as the mirage did. Others may dream that you are lying in your bed. But for you this world or locality no longer exists. You are now in a dream within a dream.
Both of these dreams waking and sleeping are codependent, or one single cycle and support each other. If you do not think that your waking state is codependent on your sleeping state, try not sleeping for a year or two and see what happens to your sanity.
Q: Now, there is still a dependently arisen chair obviously present. Yet as is said, the chair is like an illusion because it is always changing and it has no self -substance. But, it is not actually an illusion because it isn't actually just a nothingness.
S9: Of course not, it is a dream chair, or a mental object. Dreams usually include explanations.
You must step outside of an illusion in order to see that it was an illusion. Sometimes you do this with clarity as in, “Oh, it was a mirage.” Sometimes if the whole darn thing become Clear, as it did with Buddha, you Wake Up.
Q: No, reality is very real.
S9: “Reality is real” is a tautology and actually says nothing. The question must be, “What is Ultimately Real?”
Q: It's just that mind is really all there is.
S9: How do you know this?
Q: Reality is certainly not an abstraction.
S9: How do you know this? Would a dreamer claim this of a dream from within the dream?
Q: If you kick a rock that pain you feel is not an abstraction, it is very real.
S9: It is dream pain. That old adage about a pinch not being felt by a dreamer is incorrect. Many people forget on waking just how convincing a dream is, and how realistic while it is taking place. We never even question a dream until we begin to wake up. Much like we Buddhist are beginning to question waking life.
I’ll stop here before I need to find a publisher for my book. ; ^ )
<o>:)
For example, if a sound was 'just mind', the mind could will that sound to cease. But mind cannot do this.
Mind can only influence its relationship with the sound rather than end the sounds existence.
When the Buddha first taught anatta, he taught the mind cannot will things to be as the mind wishes. This is why all things are not mind.
i'm not sure if this is true, in this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1oK4Vt_ntY&feature=related this man is talking about ajahn chah saying "there was some kind of a party in the village, some kind of music, and he realized that in the meditations, the meditative state, he didn't hear anything, he was completely aware, bright, sharp, one-pointed, but he couldn't hear anything, outside. but if he decided to hear, he could hear. so this was a real discovery for him... you know it's quite proof that the awareness was one thing, and the sound was another thing, they were separate..."
We understand. You are refering to consciousness or the naturally luminous awareness.
This is impermanent. There is no stream of consciousness. The Buddha did not teach like this.
Agreed, There is no such thing as "Awarenes" . It is just a turn of phrase. Cannot of course speak for xabir, but I doubt he would affirm an entity called "Naturally luminous Awareness"
Sometime Dhamma Dhatu (when Ive dried out a bit from this posting addiction:D) lets try and find some middle ground. Between you as Ordained Theravadin Sangha (?), and Sangha of other Buddhist traditions. So the legitamcy of all is appreciated.
S9: Are you under the opinion that in a dream things/thoughts are not impermanent, or not co-dependent, or not ungraspable?
No of course not. : ^ )
I think that you would have to agree that a thought when awake or when dreaming is still just a thought. That all thoughts, not matter the time of day, or the circumstance of their appearance are impermanent, codependent, and ungraspable, and that this efficiently describes the nature of thought, awake or sleeping.
Mind is thought, and thought is mind. These are two names for the same exact thing.
Thoughts are in the mind similar to the way that clouds are in the sky. Mind allows thoughts, and the sky allows clouds. But you cannot simply reverse this and say that clouds allow the sky, or that thoughts allow the mind, because they are not equal in this way, and besides this it would not be accurate.
Of course not. I am saying that in a real dream like when we fall asleep, things are illusory mind projections, whereas what I'm saying is that phenomena as we experienced it is not just an illusion. It is not all just 'thoughts' or 'imagination'.
It is like a dream, but yet vividly appearing, the sensation and thought itself is vivid presence of awareness. That can't be denied, just as the presence of Being/I AMness which you have felt cannot be denied. In fact even thoughts itself is a vivid presence... a thought may be illusory in the sense that it is a thought projection (like the dream world in dreaming state), or perhaps there is a visual sight of a illusory mirage, yet the vivid presence of the so called 'illusion' thought or sensation cannot be denied. Even though vividly present, it self-liberates spontaneously without a trace, and has no inherent, independent or permanent existence, hence it is LIKE an illusion but NOT an illusion.
But anyway, we must not fall under the illusion that 'all things are just mind's illusion'. The reason why we cannot say that the world is an illusion is because that would imply there is another reality APART FROM the so called 'world'. It is not like that, and Buddha never taught things that way. That is Advaita maybe, but definitely not Buddhism. There is no Brahman transcending illusory world in Buddhism. There's just the correct insights about the nature of reality, of what we call 'world'.
In Buddhism we don't wake up 'from the illusory world' to find another reality like Brahman, but we wake up 'from our illusions' (of subject-object, perceiver/perceived duality, or of self-existing and permanent self/things) to the world as it Actually is, luminous and empty.
It is better to put it this way, as my friend Longchen said:
No, no, life is not an illusion. It is dangerous to think that way. It is what you perceive of as self-existing and permanent that is an illusion. If one think that life is an illusion, one may go on to deny the things that we experience in life.
An Advaita author David Carse talks about his non-dual insight:
After the jungle, there is an intensely odd and very beau-tiful quality to the experience of life. In one sense I can only describe everything, all experience, as having a certain emptiness. This is the sense in which everything used to matter, to be vital and important, and is now seen as unreal, empty, not important, an illusion. Once it is seen that the beyond-brilliance of Sat Chit Ananda is all that is, the dream continues as a kind of shadow. Yet, at the same moment that all of what appears in the dream is experi-enced as empty, it is also seen as more deeply beautiful and perfect than ever imagined, precisely because it is not other than Sat Chit Ananda, than all that is. Everything that does not matter, that is empty illusion, is at the same time itself the beyond-brilliance, the perfect beauty. Somehow there is a balance; these two apparently opposite aspects do not cancel each other out but complement each other. This makes no 'sense,' yet it is how it is.
There is one tradition within Advaita which says that maya, the manifestation of the physical universe, is over-laid or superimposed on Sat Chit Ananda. I'm no scholar of these things, and can only attempt to describe what is seen here; and the Understanding here is that there is no question of one thing superimposed on another. Maya, the manifestation, the physical universe, is precisely Sat Chit Ananda, is not other than it, does not exist on its own as something separate to be overlaid on top of something else. This is the whole point! There is no maya! The only reason it appears to have its own reality and is commonly taken to be real in itself is because of a misperceiving, a mistaken perception which sees the appearance and not What Is. This is the meaning of Huang Po's comment that "no distinction should be made between the Absolute and the sentient world." No distinction! There is only One. There is not ever in any sense two. All perception of distinction and separation, all perception of duality, and all perception of what is known as physical reality, is mind-created illu-sion. When a teacher points at the physical world and says, "All this is maya," what is being said is that what you are seeing is illusion; what all this is is All That Is, pure Being Consciousness Bliss Outpouring; it is your perception of it as a physical world that is maya, illusion.
Regarding the analogy of sky and clouds, Thusness told me before several months back when I talked about not being fixated on thoughts and resting as sky-like awareness: Yes not to be fixated but also not to objectify the “spaciousness” otherwise “spaciousness” is no less fixated. The ‘space’ appears appealing only to a mind that abstracts but to a fully participating and involving mind, such “spaciousness” has immediately sets itself apart, distancing itself from inseparable. Emptiness is never a behind background but a fully partaking foreground manifesting as the arising and passing phenomena absence of a center.Therefore understand ‘spaciousness’ not like sky but like passing clouds and flowing water, manifesting whenever condition is. If ‘Emptiness’ has made us more fixated and immobilized this innate freedom of our non-dual luminosity, then it is ‘stubborn emptiness’. Nevertheless, no matter what said, it is always inadequate. If we want to fully realize the inexpressible, be willing to give up all centers and point of references that manifests in the form of ‘who’, ‘when’ and ‘where’. Just give up the entire sense of self then instantly all things are spontaneously perfected.
And the Zen Patriarch Bodhidharma states: The mind’s capacity is limitless, and its conditional functions are inexhaustible. With the condition of eyes, forms are seen, With the condition of ears, sounds are heard, With the condition of nose, smells are smelled, With the condition of tongue, tastes are tasted, every movement or states are all one's Mind.
(心量广大，应用无穷，应眼见色，应耳闻声，应鼻嗅香，应舌知味，乃至施为运动，皆是自 心。)
Also you need to experience non-dual to see that sensations, thoughts, itself is Buddha-Nature. Otherwise there is just resting in background, the I AM. When non-dual insight arise, there is no resting place because all is it.
There's a lot of things we assume about thoughts, like 'it's just illusion, just a dream, blah blah' but that is just analysis. You may think that you are truly observing a thought, but you are not. First there is the direct experience of the I AM in a state of thoughtlessness, a pure presence and beingness which is vivid and undeniable, but then later the mind analyses and divides it from all other things which it labels as 'a dream'. But what is the direct experience of a thought as it ACTUALLY happens? As Thrangu Rinpoche says, there must be a naked, direct, experience of the nature of thought, as nakedly and directly without intermediary as the direct experience of the I AM. It is a vivid luminous presence that is simultaneously empty. Same goes for all other sense perceptions (which he elaborated in other chapters). Direct naked experience is not a mere dream.
....Although one recognizes the cognitive lucidity or the lucidity of awareness within emptiness, there are different ways that this might be recognized. For example, someone might find that when they look at the nature of a thought, initially the thought arises, and then as the thought dissolves, what it leaves in its wake or what it leaves behind it is an experience or recognition of the unity of cognitive lucidity and emptiness. Because this person has recognized this cognitive lucidity and emptiness, there is some degree of recognition, but because this can only occur for them or has only occurred for them after the thought has subsided or vanished, then they are still not really seeing the nature of thought itself. For someone else, they might experience that from the moment of the thought's arising, and for the entire presence of that thought, it remains a unity of cognitive lucidity and emptiness. This is a correct identification, because whenever there is a thought present in the mind or when there is no thought present in the mind, and whether or not that thought is being viewed in this way or not, the nature of the mind and the nature of every thought is always a unity of cognitive lucidity and emptiness. It is not the case that thoughts only become that as they vanish.
The word naked is used a great deal at this point in the text. And the word naked here has a very specific and important meaning because it is used to distinguish between understanding and experience, that is to say, understanding and recognition. it is very easy to confuse one's understanding for an experience or a recognition. One might understand something about the mind and therefore think that one had recognized it directly. Here, the use of the term "naked" means "direct;" that is to say, something that is experienced nakedly or directly in the sense that the experience is free from the overlay of concepts.
Whereas normally we have the attitude that thought is something we must get rid of, in this case it is made clear that it is important not to get rid of thought, but to recognize its nature, and indeed, not only the nature of thought but the nature of stillness must be recognized. In particular, with regard to thought, as long as we do not recognize its nature, of course thought poses a threat to meditation and becomes an impediment. But once the nature of thought has been correctly recognized, thought itself becomes the meditative state and therefore it is often said that "the root of meditation is recognizing the nature of thought."
There lived in the eighteenth century a great Gelugpa teacher named Changkya Rolpe Dorje, who from his early youth displayed the signs of being an extraordinary person. He became particularly learned and also very realized, and at one point he composed a song called 'Recognizing Mother.' 'Mother' in his song is the word he uses to refer to dharmata or the nature of one's mind. This song was so extraordinary that a commentary was written about it by Khenchen Mipam Rinpoche. In this song, Changkya Rolpe Dorje makes a very clear distinction between recognizing and not recognizing the nature of one's mind. In one part of the song he says, "Nowadays we scholars of the Gelugpa tradition, in discarding these appearances of the mind as the basis for the realization of emptiness and of the basis for the negation of true existence, and in searching for something beyond this to refute, something beyond this to negate in order to realize emptiness, have left our old mother behind; in other words, we have missed the point of emptiness."
Changkya Rolpe Dorje gives another image for this mistake that we tend to make. he says that we are like a small child who is sitting in his mother's lap but forgetting where he is, looks for his mother everywhere; looks above, below, left and right and is unable to see his mother and becomes quite agitated. Along comes the child's older brother, and the image the older brother represents is both the understanding of interdependence and the recognition of the nature of thought. The older brother reminds the child by saying, "Your mother is right here, you are in her lap." In the same way, the nature of our mind or emptiness is with us all the time, we tend to look for it indirectly; we look for it somewhere outside ourselves, somewhere far away. And yet we do not need to look far away if we simply view the nature of thought as it is."...
dd: in actuality, most of the fully enlightened disciples were such within 14 days
As the Buddha revealed in the Wisdom sutras/Pajnaparimitra sutras , when he preached the more advance teaching of the Maha Bodhi ( Mahayana ) , many of the audience do not have the capacity to receive it, he state that they are poor ( in karmic relationship with it ) , they are blind ( to see the higher truth ), they are deaf ( to hear the higher truth ) , they are mute ( to clarify on the higher truth ), and they are cripple ( to walk the path of higher truth )
X: I am saying that in a real dream like when we fall asleep, things are illusory mind projections, whereas what I'm saying is that phenomena as we experienced it is not just an illusion. It is not all just 'thoughts' or 'imagination'.
S9: No, what else are phenomena then, besides thoughts? Don’t say Awareness, please, as we both agree that there is ‘Constant Awareness,’ but sometimes Awareness is without illusions, illusion being described as wrongful view/or wrong perspective.
When we think that Awareness is being thought, what we are saying is that Awareness cannot be without thoughts. Any advanced meditator will tell you, in a New York minute, that this simply isn’t the case. Granted thoughts cannot be without Awareness, but this is because Awareness lends temporary existence to these thoughts, not the other way around. Can you see that they are not equal in this way? Thoughts are pure imagination, just as dreams are.
X: The presence of Being/I AMness
S9: I Am is not the same thing as I-Amness, meaning a process or thought, Awareness is a Constant Presence, and thoughts/processes/actions only come and go.
X: Even thoughts itself is a vivid presence... a thought may be illusory in the sense that it is a thought projection (like the dream world in dreaming state), or perhaps there is a visual sight of a illusory mirage, yet the vivid presence of the so called 'illusion' thought or sensation cannot be denied.
S9: I do not deny that thought exists anymore than I deny that imagination exists. What I do deny is that thought has its own Essence and that thought is as Equally REAL as Awareness.
X: Even though vividly present, it self-liberates spontaneously without a trace.
S9: Thoughts liberate? I don’t think so.
Even the limited mind (or ego mind) is not liberated…it can only clarify itself, or come to an understanding of a limited kind. Mind is a perfect tool for clarifying what it Awareness isn’t.
Awareness does not become liberated either, as it was never actually captured within thought. You can turn your head in any instant are see Awareness in its full glory, whole and complete within its self. Thoughts cannot ever alter Awareness. Thought only captures thought and creates confusion within thoughts.
X: Illusion…”has no inherent, independent or permanent existence, hence it is LIKE an illusion but NOT an illusion.”
S9: Just because illusion doesn’t have its own essence and only borrows this from Awareness to exist, doesn’t mean that illusion is Not an illusion, anymore than a unicorn is real because it borrows thought or imagination. Obviously a unicorn is a product of our IMAGINATION. Is it not? This world is a unicorn.
yogacharan ( who are the most expert in the mind analyse ) will tell you there are different layers of what we call 'mind'.
there are 8 layers of consciousness,
and the trikaya is also means the 3 different layers of the mind
the confusion above in this tread , is basically each has different understanding on the meaning of mind due to different level of teaching
It is not easy for the zenist to explain mind because they basically speak from the absolute level, and they do not have engage themselve in abhidharma(kosha) type of analysis ground work in their teaching.
A: The confusion above in this thread, is basically each has different understanding on the meaning of mind due to different level of teaching.
S9: This is possibly true, however rather than levels of teachings, I think I would call it depths of understanding. I don’t believe this is a trivial distinction, as when we look more deeply at the very same thing, it is layers of mind that fall away and leave us eventually with the purist understanding, or Awake.
In Zen, many masters hold, that we are all Buddhas, perfect as we are, even if we don't practice.
This is a doctrine in Japanese Buddhism known as honjaku (?) or "original enlightenment", that was popular in Tendai Buddhism originally, but sometimes influenced other schools that derived from Tendai (especially Zen). Other Tendai-based schools like the Pure Land schools and Nichiren schools did not subscribe to this view.
Now my question is:
- Did the historical Buddha also think so?
- Some other schools seem to present the path to Awakening as an ascent.
- Are there any references in the Sutras about being a Buddha before you start practicing?
1. No.
2. Most of them do actually. Mahayana Buddhism (including Zen) tradtionally sees the Buddhist path as extremely long (3 asamkhya kalpas or something like that), and the Bodhisattva Path has 10 stages in most texts, sometimes 42. Esoteric Buddhism tends to view these as symbolic, not literal, but we're talking about Mahayana at the moment.
3. No, I would be very surprised if you found one. There are teachings in things like the Lankavatara about the potential for Enlightenment (womb of Buddhahood, etc), but not necessarily being a Buddha. These are two different things.
historical , "honjaku / original enlightenment" doctrine in middle age Japan's Tendai school has went into wrong way, and resultant of it's decline. But the Japanese schools have learned the this pitfall and made an u-turn back to the proper understanding of original intent of this doctrine ( which was derived from Chinese Mahayana Tientai & Huayan etc schools , in which is only speaking it from the absolute domain )
advance Mahayana talks about attainting Buddhahood in one's life time, but they are based on the principle an odinary men when awaken is known as a buddha, while deluded is known as common mortal. They view that all Buddhas named in scriptures are all provisional Buddhas ( skillful means ) with the intented wisdom to guide the common man to enter the dharma gate. Hence the statement of there are no Buddha outside the mind, or the common people ( buddha nature ) themselve are the actual Buddha to be awaken.
which match with the Mahayana statement of the mind, the living beings and the Thus Come One are without distinction ( from the absolute perspective )
S9: No, what else are phenomena then, besides thoughts? Don’t say Awareness, please, as we both agree that there is ‘Constant Awareness,’ but sometimes Awareness is without illusions, illusion being described as wrongful view/or wrong perspective.
When we think that Awareness is being thought, what we are saying is that Awareness cannot be without thoughts. Any advanced meditator will tell you, in a New York minute, that this simply isn’t the case. Granted thoughts cannot be without Awareness, but this is because Awareness lends temporary existence to these thoughts, not the other way around. Can you see that they are not equal in this way? Thoughts are pure imagination, just as dreams are.
First of all there is no objective reality to thoughts, vision of tree, etc. Like David Carse said, what all this is is All That Is, pure Being Consciousness Bliss Outpouring; it is your perception of it as a physical world that is maya, illusion.
Awareness is not a tree or a thought in the sense that Awareness obviously is not objective like a 'thing' existing 'outside' separate from us. In fact, nothing exists 'outside', as explained earlier:
"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
In actuality no sound, no thought, no perception, is actually an objective reality. They are only Mind, or Awareness, they do not exist outside. There is no objectively existing tree or a thought. The notion of sensations and perceptions having objectivity is really just an illusory mental construct. Seeing through this mental construct, one dissolves everything into just one whole field of experiential reality. The self-manifestations commonly known as 'objects' aren't really 'outer objects' but are rather perceptions arising and vanishing momentarily in/as this One Mind, so that cannot form an identity of sorts. Since there is no objective reality to begin with, Awareness cannot be identified with any objects. However one who experiences One Mind is also different from the I AM stage since the One Mind is not purely Subjective Reality like a Subject behind all things, rather one experiences non-dual with everything perceived/experienced, one whole experiential field in which subject and object are inseparably incorporated. There is no more sense of 'distance' between awareness and objects, perceiver and perceived, for the very substance of all sensations/perceptions IS Awareness. Awareness is the very substance of the entire experiential field, not an observer observing it. There is no Awareness inside and objects outside, there is just Oneness appearing as sights, sounds, thoughts, etc.
At this stage it's seen nothing exists outside of or apart from Mind/Awareness, so all is just manifestation of the One Mind and is none other than It, so you dissolve all dharmas (notions of objectivity) into One Mind. Many Advaitins do eventually reach this stage.
So the first step is seeing the falsity of the division between Mind and phenomena, giving rise to non-dual insight or One Mind. However, there will still be some remaining notions of the One Mind as something permanent and independent. There must be insight into 'how' Mind and phenomena actually co-arise - there isn't a sense of Mind as a Source, and phenomena arising out of, or within, or being part of, this One Mind. Phenomena actually has no beginning and end, and therefore we cannot say phenomena began and originated or ended from/within a permanent Source. All these are false notions which are also dependent on notion of time, an illusory construct.
The notion of One Mind as permanent as opposed to things beginning and ending in time, the notion of Mind being the source of appearances coming and going within this One Source, are all false views, and are all the views of inherency. Time, beginning, end, and an origin/Source, etc are all false views. One must see all these are just more illusory mental constructs in the same way as 'objectivity' is, there must be an arising insight that burns away these views. If we see that mind is not the 'source of phenomena', then we realise there is just phenomena, sensations and perceptions which are all 'mind', but without an independent, permanent, substratum, essence or Source. There is no temporal existence beginning and ending, arising from and then subsiding back 'in' Mind, since mind and phenomena (can't even be separated) have 'both' existed since beginningless 'time', there is no One Mind being the first cause, no Mind being permanent vs phenomena being temporal (having beginning and end) -- can't even be divided in the subtlest way -- there is just one co-arising without subject and object division, just phenomena/mind. All phenomena are timeless and without origin. There is just mind, but not a permanent independent mind/source, but mind as transient phenomena itself, without beginning or end, without time. One then understands what Zen Master Dogen mean by 'Impermanence is Buddha-Nature'. When Zen Master Dogen said Impermanence, he was very clear that his Impermanence is Timeless Impermanence, not temporal existence existing against a permanent background (I AM), nor a permanent undivided One Mind. And yes Awareness is ever-present but not a dead ever-presence but a dynamic ever-presencing as the flow/transience. Not Awareness, more like 'Awaring'. When there is insight into BOTH non-dual + anatta, there is no more referencing back into something permanent and independent, instead there is complete affirmation of transience. There is no more desync of view with (nondual) experience, no more dualising of Absolute and relative, absolutely no divisions.
There is no inherently existing or permanent 'Awareness' entity, just these sensations and perceptions and thoughts which are not objective, but not subjective, either. No awareness not as in 'dead' but no awareness as a metaphysical essence or observer of things.
There is no inherently existing or permanent 'Awareness' entity, just these sensations and perceptions and thoughts which are not objective, but not subjective, either. No awareness not as in 'dead' but no awareness as a metaphysical essence or observer of things or the ultimate source of all things. Everything is a radiant expression of itself, and not a manifestation of some One Mind or Source. The expression itself is mind/awareness, not expression 'OF' but expression 'as'.
I think Richard Herman wrote that previously:
Yes, it is the absolute "elimination of the background" without remainder. It is the affirmation of multiplicity, not dispersion, but multiplicity. The world references nothing but the world. Each thing is radiant expression of itself. There is no support, no ground. No awareness. No awareness.
"All dharmas are resolved in One Mind. One Mind resolves into...."
There is the radiant world. just the radiant world. No awareness.
That is the Abbott slapping floor with his hand. The red floor is red. Spontaneous function.
There is no question of whether Awareness depends on thoughts when there is no independent, permanent entity, or separate 'Awareness' to begin with. When one experiences non-duality, one knows that awareness isn't separate from thoughts and phenomena. Next, one must realise that there is no 'awareness' as the source in/from which phenomena arise and subside, there is no source, time, beginning and end, independence, permanence, just phenomena. There is just whatever arise according to conditions, dependent origination. There is nothing subjective, nor objective. There is just whatever happens. 'Abbot slapping floor with his hand. The red floor is red. Spontaneous function.' Then, you will also understand why the Buddha in the Nikaya or Theravada Buddhism is able to talk about awareness without making it something more ultimate than the transient mind -- he never capitalize 'Awareness', he only described dharmas, phenomena, but that all sensations are self-luminous or aware where it is is automatically implied since there is no duality of perceiver and perceived nor any notion of any inherent self nor an ultimate source in his teachings. In other words in the seen just the seen, in the heard just the heard, there is no hearer/seer/etc.
Guru Padmasambhava says:<o>
</o> "The mind that observes is also devoid of an ego or self-entity. It is neither seen as something different from the aggregates Nor as identical with these five aggregates. If the first were true, there would exist some other substance.
This is not the case, so were the second true, That would contradict a permanent self, since the aggregates are impermanent. Therefore, based on the five aggregates, The self is a mere imputation based on the power of the ego-clinging.
As to that which imputes, the past thought has vanished and is nonexistent. The future thought has not occurred, and the present thought does not withstand scrutiny."<o></o>
So 'no awareness' does not really mean no awareness, but no ultimate identity (whether Objective nor Subjective nor Integrated), Self, subject-object division, nor essence, permanence, independence, etc. to awareness.
S9: I do not deny that thought exists anymore than I deny that imagination exists. What I do deny is that thought has its own Essence and that thought is as Equally REAL as Awareness.
Neither am I saying that thoughts have its own essence. Thoughts, like trees, do not have essence nor objective reality. They are all just Mind only, but Mind also has no independent or permanent reality. Mind is Luminous, Vivid, but Empty, and cannot be spoken of as an entity apart from phenomena. Viewed correctly, whatever arise, is Mind, but also there is no independent/permanent Mind as a source of arising, Mind too is empty (of self-existing independence, permanence, etc). When we say thought is Awareness, I don't mean Awareness as an unchanging entity (awareness is empty), but Awareness as a point of luminous clarity, as a manifestation.
So the Third Karmapa wrote:
Through the examination of external objects we see the mind, not the objects.
Through the examination of the mind we see its empty essence, but not the mind.
Through the examination of both, attachment to duality disappears by itself.
May the clear light, the true essence of mind, be recognized.
.........
Self-manifestation, which has never existed as such, is erroneously seen as an object.
Through ignorance, self-awareness is mistakenly experienced as an I.
Through attachment to this duality we are caught in the conditioned world.
May the root of confusion be found.
S9: Thoughts liberate? I don’t think so.
Even the limited mind (or ego mind) is not liberated…it can only clarify itself, or come to an understanding of a limited kind. Mind is a perfect tool for clarifying what it Awareness isn’t.
Awareness does not become liberated either, as it was never actually captured within thought. You can turn your head in any instant are see Awareness in its full glory, whole and complete within its self. Thoughts cannot ever alter Awareness. Thought only captures thought and creates confusion within thoughts.
We have to understand that liberation is understood different according to one's insight.
Firstly, when Awareness is understood dualistically, as Subject opposed to Object, liberation consists of detaching Subject from Object. This is called Disassociation. One disassociate from all objects to 'enter' Pure Subject, and so freedom/liberation is the 'freedom from' the pain of finite objects, as Ken Wilber said: "With this discovery… you are halfway home. You have disidentified from any and all finite objects; you rest as infinite Consciousness. You are free, open, empty, clear, radiant, released, liberated, exalted, drenched in a blissful emptiness that exists prior to space, prior to time, prior to tears and terror, prior to pain and mortality and suffering and death. You have found the great Unborn, the vast Abyss, the unqualifiable Ground of all that is, and all that was, and all that ever shall be."
And Longchen said: Just my opinion only,
I think Eckhart Tolle may have been suffering alot and suddenly he 'let go' of trying to work out his problems. This results in a dissociation from thoughts which give rise to the experience of Presence.
To me, 'I AM' is an experience of Presence, it is just that only one aspect of Presence is experienced which is the 'all-pervading' aspect. The non-dual and emptiness aspect are not experienced.. Because non-dual is not realised (at I AM stage), a person may still use effort in an attempt to 'enter' the Presence. This is because, at the I AM stage, there is an erroneous concept that there is a relative world make up of thoughts AND there is an 'absolute source' that is watching it. The I AM stage person will make attempts to 'dissociated from the relative world' in order to enter the 'absolute source'.
However, at Non-dual (& further..) stage understanding, one have understood that the division into a relative world and an absolute source has NEVER occcured and cannot be... Thus no attempt/effort is truly required.
But as Ken Wilber said, that is just halfway, not the full insight into the true nature of Awareness, but just an initial glimpse of Awareness's luminosity. At this stage Awareness is still understood dualistically, and liberation consists of 'disassociation'.
The next step is the insight of non-duality which Ken Wilber too describes well later in his article, in which there is no more attempt to disassociate. However there are many levels or depths of non-dual insight. At first there will be inherent view of Awareness as the substance, but one will not disassociate, one will experience all sensations to be the substance of Awareness itself without division of perceiver and perceived. But there is no clarity of view.
One must have further insight into Anatta, one is freed from the bonds of inherency and duality, there is deep insight into what is 'always and already so', or in Dzogchen where the term 'self-liberation' originated, 'spontaneously self-perfected' -- always already, all arising are by nature luminous and empty, non-dual, anatta, empty, but we mistaken it as dualistic and inherent. It is the deeply rooted wrong view that shapes and distorts experience that causes all problems.
So at the moment when you see that all arising are by nature non-dual and empty, whatever is experienced: sounds, thoughts, sensations, everything just self-liberates on its own accord. Phenomena are always already arising and subsiding, but once self-liberation is experienced, phenomena arise and subside like drawing on pond and leaves no traces, there is no grasping. Best part is that NO EFFORT is required to disassociate from phenomena (when there is no source behind, what is there to dis-associate?) or maintain any state in order to liberate, the only problem is our inherent and dualistic views. But if we see with our entire body/mind/soul that all sensations and phenomena are by nature luminous and empty, they spontaneously self-liberate effortlessly. But if we view them dualistically and inherently, that is bondage. In Thusness words, "it is not negative feelings is already liberated... all sort of nonsense". And it is not that there is nothing to do as in the case of Advaita Vedanta. They missed the importance of dissolving the views and how it relates to true liberation. In Buddhism one must see how ignorance is the cause of suffering and how wrong views shape our experience. It is the wrong view that causes psychological and spiritual pain, and at any moment there is wrong view, you will experience suffering. Practice is thus dynamic to see such tendencies arise moment to moment. Yet even after liberation, sour is still sour, pain is still pain, whatever arise according to conditions cannot be denied, yet simultaneously there is no suffering.
It is important to know that mind is itself liberation. That is why knowing the nature of our mind is the way of liberation. If Liberation is not experienced, then the clarity is still not there. There is no true understanding of what mind is.
Liberation is this Pristine Awareness itself in its natural state. That is why understanding this Pristine Awareness is the direct path towards liberation. If we cannot see that the 5 aggregates are themselves our Buddha Nature, then we will not understand there is nothing to shunt from the transience. Thought liberates, sound liberates, tastes liberates. The transience liberates. If we do not see that, then we are taking a gradual path. It is also not advisable to speak too much about spontaneous arising or self liberation. It can be quite misleading.
S9: Just because illusion doesn’t have its own essence and only borrows this from Awareness to exist, doesn’t mean that illusion is Not an illusion, anymore than a unicorn is real because it borrows thought or imagination. Obviously a unicorn is a product of our IMAGINATION. Is it not? This world is a unicorn.
Warm Regards,
S9
What is illusion is the sense of a truly existing 'me' perceiving a truly existing 'object'.
For example if we imagine a unicorn and think that it is truly existing, that is an illusion.
If we imagine a unicorn, but does not treat that as truly existing, then it is just a thought but not an illusion. We are not under the illusion of it as truly existing.
Thoughts, sight, vision, they arise and subside but are not illusion. Thought is a vivid luminous presence and is empty/ungraspable, but is not an illusion, it is undeniably present and vivid as awareness. It is our view of subject and object duality, perceiver and perceived, or viewing things 'inherently', self-existing and permanent that is illusion.
The world (there is no world in the objective sense anyway, just one field of experiential reality) btw, is not just made of thoughts. Stop thinking, you still spontaneously hear, see, smell, taste, touch. And anyway I won't even say that thoughts are illusions. Thought is just as it is, it is our clinging to them as objective, real, permanent, existing, etc that is illusion.
Whilst I will not disagree about the illusion theory, such reasoning is unnecessary. The Buddha occassionally spoke about illusion but did not emphasise it. The Buddha emphasised impermanence & dispassion. <O>
</O>
<O></O>
Nagarjuna may have taught this way but the Buddha did not. To the Buddha, samsara is the cycle of ignorance, craving & attachment. The Buddha ended samsara, completely.
Indeed, in Nagarjuna’s words.
Nagarjuna appears to regard the sense spheres and aggregates as samsara. This reasoning is flawed because it is rooted in nihilism as it would assert the end of samsara is the end of consciousness existence.
Samsara is not the sensory world around us. Samsara is dukkha. Nibbana is not dukkha. Dukkha is regarding the five aggregates as "I" and "mine". Nibbana is the cessation of greed, hatred & delusion or afflictive emotions. The sense spheres per se are not dukkha. The Buddha provided one unusual discription of emptiness to negate the future wrong views he saw would occur:
This is delusion & mere subjectivity. Subjectively, indeed, the rock is dependent on our consciousness for its existence. But objectively, based in intelligent reasoning, the rock is independent of our consciousness because when we leave the rock by travelling to another location, it goes. When we return, the rock is still there.
The Buddha did not regard such views as necessary to discuss. The Buddha was concerned with the nature of dukkha & nibbana. Such views are 'white darkness' , 'bright delusion' or 'defiled insight', beguiled or tricked by the experience of consciousness.
The Buddha did not say everything is just mind and has One Taste. The Buddha said the Dhamma has One Taste, namely, the taste of freedom. Adhamma is not freedom. Samsara is not freedom. The Buddha taught there are five aggregates rather than one aggregate of mind.
Suffering & non-suffering are dependent on the mind. But not everything is mind. This is subjectivity rather than truth.
For example, if a sound was 'just mind', the mind could will that sound to cease. But mind cannot do this.
Mind can only influence its relationship with the sound rather than end the sounds existence.
When the Buddha first taught anatta, he taught the mind cannot will things to be as the mind wishes. This is why all things are not mind.
The Buddha taught the arising & passing of mind (consciousness) has been discerned. Consciousness is not a stream or continuum and thus all things are not mind.
Sadhu! Sadhu! Sadhu!
Lets not stink of premature claims to know Buddhanature. That should be a cause for mouthwash.
Sadhu! Sadhu! Sadhu!
Lets not stink of premature claims to know Buddhanature. That should be a cause for mouthwash.
Since Dhamma Dhatu is hard core Theravadin, he does not accept teachings of Buddha-nature in the first place. Nor does he accept teachings from Nagarjuna.
Q: Liberation is this Pristine Awareness itself in its natural state. That is why understanding this Pristine Awareness is the direct path towards liberation.
S9: I am going to address your whole post. But, please tell me this. How can you write these words, and then turn around and say there is no Awareness. This confuses me.
Q: Liberation is this Pristine Awareness itself in its natural state. That is why understanding this Pristine Awareness is the direct path towards liberation.
S9: I am going to address your whole post. But, please tell me this. How can you write these words, and then turn around and say there is no Awareness. This confuses me.
Thanx,
S9
Sorry don't bother, my previous reply is no good. Re-writing...
Originally posted by An Eternal Now:
Something I wrote in another forum, and re-edited, after discussing with Thusness (and still probably imperfect).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Subjectivity9 S9: No, what else are phenomena then, besides thoughts? Don’t say Awareness, please, as we both agree that there is ‘Constant Awareness,’ but sometimes Awareness is without illusions, illusion being described as wrongful view/or wrong perspective.
When we think that Awareness is being thought, what we are saying is that Awareness cannot be without thoughts. Any advanced meditator will tell you, in a New York minute, that this simply isn’t the case. Granted thoughts cannot be without Awareness, but this is because Awareness lends temporary existence to these thoughts, not the other way around. Can you see that they are not equal in this way? Thoughts are pure imagination, just as dreams are.
I think it is better to approach this way:
Non-conceptual thought VS conceptual thought instead of Awareness VS Thoughts.
If you see it is “Awareness Vs Thoughts”, then it is dualistic and inherent view. If you see it as non-conceptual thought, then eventually you will realize both non-conceptual and conceptual thoughst share the same luminous essence and empty nature. Non-conceptual thought is non-verbal and direct. It appears still and with the tendency to reify it is often mistaken as ‘Unchanging Witness’.
Therefore in your experience of the “I AMness”, I advise you to understand this experience from the perspective of “direct and non-conceptual aspect of perception” and how by being “direct and non-conceptual” creates that sort of ‘certain, unshakable and undeniable’ confidence. That is, if a practitioner is fully authenticated from moment to moment the arising and passing phenomena, the practitioner will always have this sensation of ‘certain and unshaken’ confidence.
First of all there is no objective reality to thoughts, vision of tree, etc. Like David Carse said, what all this is is All That Is, pure Being Consciousness Bliss Outpouring; it is your perception of it as a physical world that is maya, illusion.
Awareness is not a tree or a thought in the sense that Awareness obviously is not objective like a 'thing' existing 'outside' separate from us. In fact, nothing exists 'outside', as explained earlier:
"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
What David Carse said requires more than the “I AMness” realization you narrated in your post “Certainty of Being”. It also requires more than just glimpses of the non-dual state that can be induced by penetrating the question: "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
It requires a practitioner to be sufficiently clear about the cause of ‘separation’ so that the perceptual knot that creates the ‘division’ is thoroughly seen through. At this phase, non-dual becomes quite effortless. The three following articles that you posted in your blog are all about the thorough insights of seeing through the illusionary division created by mental constructs. They are all very well written. It is worth revisiting these articles.
1. Body/No-Body
2. The Teachings of Atmananda and the Direct Path
3. The Direct Path
Of all the 3 articles, I like Joan’s article Body/No-body best. Do not simply go through the motion of reading, read with a reverent heart. Though a simple article but is not any less insightful than those written by well-known masters, it has all the answers and pointers you need.
Next, there are several points you made that is related to the deconstruction of mental objects but you should also note that there exist a predictable relationship between the 'mental object to be de-constructed' and 'the experiences and realizations'. For example “The Teachings of Atmananda and the Direct Path” will, more often than not lead a practitioner to the realization of One Mind whereas the article from Joan will lead one to the experiential insight of No-Mind. As a general guideline,
1. If you de-construct the subjective pole, you will be led to the experience of No-Mind.
2. If you de-construct the objective pole, you will be led to the experience of One-Mind.
3. If you go through a process of de-constructing prepositional phrases like "in/out" "inside/outside" "into/onto," "within/without" "here/there", you will dissolve the illusionary nature of locality and time.
4. If you simply go through the process of self-enquiry by disassociation and elimination without clearly understanding the non-inherent and dependent originated nature of phenomena, you will be led to the experience of “I AMness”.
Lastly, not to talk too much about self-liberation or the natural state, it can sound extremely misleading. Although Joan Tollifson spoke of the natural non-dual state is something “so simple, so immediate, so obvious, so ever-present that we often overlook”, we have to understand that to even come to this realization of the “Simplicity of What Is”, a practitioner will need to undergo a painstaking process of de-constructing the mental constructs. We must be deeply aware of the ‘blinding spell’ in order to understand consciousness. I believe Joan must have gone through a period of deep confusions, not to under-estimate it.
Q: I think it is better to approach this way:
Non-conceptual thought VS conceptual thought instead of Awareness VS Thoughts.
S9: I don’t see why. Conceptual and non-conceptual thoughts are still just thoughts, whereas Awareness is not a thought. I think what we are trying to get at here is, what is Awareness. Are we not?
Q: If you see it is “Awareness Vs Thoughts,” then it is dualistic and inherent view. If you see it as non-conceptual thought, then eventually you will realize both non-conceptual and conceptual thoughts share the same luminous essence and empty nature.
S9: Since the reason that Awareness is called empty, in the first place, is because it is actually empty of thoughts. Why then would we be trying to say that Awareness and thoughts are the same exact thing? Awareness is more like the ocean, and thoughts are more like waves in the ocean. these waves come up and going down, but without any personal essence outside of what the ocean lends to them temporarily. These waves are much like what dreams are.
Q: Non-conceptual thought is non-verbal and direct. It appears still and with the tendency to reify it is often mistaken as ‘Unchanging Witness.’
S9: Indeed, confusion may bring this about. But, Pure Awareness is not the part of the mind, which is often called “Unchanging Witness.”
Q: Therefore in your experience of the “I AMness”, I advise you to understand this experience from the perspective of “direct and non-conceptual aspect of perception.”
S9: I do. But this perception is fully Aware of Awareness only. It manifests in the mind as Presence.
Q: …how by being “direct and non-conceptual” creates that sort of ‘certain, unshakable and undeniable’ confidence.
S9: Exactly.
Pure Being is too immediate and direct to lend itself to thought. Of this I am confident and certain. I Am is Pure Immediate Being.Thoughts, on the other hand, are constantly becoming.
Q: Awareness is not a tree or a thought in the sense that Awareness obviously is not objective like a 'thing' existing 'outside' separate from us. In fact, nothing exists 'outside', as explained earlier.
S9: Isn’t that what I have been saying all along?
Q: "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
S9: If Awareness were not present, there would be no forest, and therefore no tree to fall, let alone an ear to hear it. This world is not a dream that proceeds unattended. But it is the dream ear that hears the dream tree fall, within Awareness/Presence, as Awareness is omnipresent. And yet, Awareness is neither thoughts, nor senses, nor material objects. All three of these are imagination only.
Q: What David Carse said requires more than the “I AMness” realization you narrated in your post “Certainty of Being.”
S9: But, I am certain of Being. In fact, Pure Being ‘IS’ all that I am certain of.
Q: It also requires more than just glimpses of the non-dual state that can be induced by penetrating the question.
S9: I am not glimpsing the non-dual state. It has come to stay and NEVER goes away.
Q: At this phase, non-dual becomes quite effortless.
S9: Why would it take effort to look right at it and see it directly? It is everywhere I look.
- Some other schools seem to present the path to Awakening as an ascent.
- Are there any references in the Sutras about being a Buddha before you start practicing?
The suttas teach a gradual path based on the Noble 8-fold Path. The root cause of suffering is ignorance and I don't see how it makes any sense to say that we're ignorant and enlightened at the same time.
P: The suttas teach a gradual path based on the Noble 8-fold Path. The root cause of suffering is ignorance and I don't see how it makes any sense to say that we're ignorant and enlightened at the same time.
S9: The ignorance is that we think we are the mind, and/or our identification with the mind. Mind is ignorant of the fact that we are not the mind, and never was the mind, and that what we call Pure Awareness or Enlightenment is who we are, and have always been, (AKA the Buddha Nature).
So in fact, we are not both ignorant and enlightened. Mind is imagining that it is ignorant and that it is the mind. We are not the mind, so we cannot count that as one of our selves. Is a mistaken view anything more than simply a mistake? Seen rightly, the mistaken view melts away.
Can we than say we are both the mistaken view AND our Ultimate True Being?
And it has continuity from moment to moment, lifetime to lifetime. (those who denies this are nihilists)
<consciousness>
The Buddha explained six types of consciousness.
Eye-consciousness
Ear-consciousness
....
Mind-consciousness
There cannot be an eye-consciousness without an eye. The eye should make contact with a form for eye-consciousness to rise. It is the initial cognition. So would you explain how consciousness arise without a physical body please?</consciousness>
There cannot be an eye-consciousness without an eye. The eye should make contact with a form for eye-consciousness to rise. It is the initial cognition. So would you explain how consciousness arise without a physical body please?
Anyone who asserts that consciousness is what is "reborn" needs to investigate the teachings a little deeper. The idea of a transmigrating "consciousness" is the result of bad translations and individual ineptitude when it comes to investigating the meaning of the teachings.
These poor translations and poor investigations are the likely cause of the tiresome and endlessly frivolous "rebirth" debate.
There cannot be an eye-consciousness without an eye. The eye should make contact with a form for eye-consciousness to rise. It is the initial cognition. So would you explain how consciousness arise without a physical body please?
Beyond that (because I am human), you may have to ask a peta (hungry ghost)
Just understand that 'sense organs' does not mean 'physical'. In fact it should be better termed 'faculty' than 'organ'. It could be psychic, non-physical sense faculties.
It would be a physicalist and annihilationist view to see all conditions and manifestation as merely physical. This is not accepted in Buddhism.
Neither am I however, suggesting an eternalist view. All these are extremes.
Anyone who asserts that consciousness is what is "reborn" needs to investigate the teachings a little deeper. The idea of a transmigrating "consciousness" is the result of bad translations and individual ineptitude when it comes to investigating the meaning of the teachings.
These poor translations and poor investigations are the likely cause of the tiresome and endlessly frivolous "rebirth" debate.
Consciousness is not 'that which' reborns. Consciousness is synonymous with rebirth. Consciousness is an arising. It's re-arising is what is termed rebirth.
Consciousness is not 'that which' reborns. Consciousness is synonymous with rebirth. Consciousness is an arising. It's re-arising is what is termed rebirth.
I am not a fan of that interpretation at all. It may very well be a workable interpretation but it doesnt cut it for a definitive explanation.
one that encapsulates and appreciates the scope of the Mahayana.
The consciousness is "reborn" moment to moment explanation is very limited and limiting if you ask me.
one that encapsulates and appreciates the scope of the Mahayana.
The consciousness is "reborn" moment to moment explanation is very limited and limiting if you ask me.
Can you elaborate on the explanation that encapsulates and appreciates the scope of the Mahayana?
It seems to me that if you are not in a position to declare, “what is,” then you certainly cannot with any integrity declare, out of hand, “what isn’t.” You can only say that this is how it seems to me, “so far,” otherwise you are simply borrowing someone else’s wisdom.
Such a long text... Most of the text is suggesting that since so and so had "out of body"/"near-death" experience and "floating body" and so on and so forth it is safe to assume that there is some form of conciseness which doesn't depend of the physical body. Also you are saying:
You are implying that it is safe to go by the word of those "extra-ordinary" people who have had out of body experiences despise what the Buddha has said in the suttas over and over again that conciseness arises and ceases based on the physical sense organs.
Just understand that 'sense organs' does not mean 'physical'. In fact it should be better termed 'faculty' than 'organ'. It could be psychic, non-physical sense faculties.
I will understand it if you provide me a good enough explanation. So please tell me what those "psychic, non-physical sense faculties" are how conciseness arise based on those said faculties. All I know is there are six types of conciseness which are based on physical sense organs.
It would be a physicalist and annihilationist view
Not necessarily. I for once do not deny there is continuity after death and I also do not accept unverifiable speculative explanations for it which contradict what the Buddha has said. It is better to say "I don't know and it is not relevant".
Such a long text... Most of the text is suggesting that since so and so had "out of body"/"near-death" experience and "floating body" and so on and so forth it is safe to assume that there is some form of conciseness which doesn't depend of the physical body. Also you are saying:
I too had out of body experiences (such as floating upwards from my room and being able to see the surroundings). I had friends who had more impressive experiences than that, and be able to communicate with beings from other realms during their out of body experience, etc. It is really not as uncommon as you think.
You are implying that it is safe to go by the word of those "extra-ordinary" people who have had out of body experiences despise what the Buddha has said in the suttas over and over again that conciseness arises and ceases based on the physical sense organs.
Buddha did not say 'physical' sense organs.
He said sense faculties, he did not say it must be 'physical'.
Where are those hungry ghosts? Have you seen any? For me it is just a mental state which is verifiable
Yes, I have seen ghost and have no doubt of their existence.
I will understand it if you provide me a good enough explanation. So please tell me what those "psychic, non-physical sense faculties" are how conciseness arise based on those said faculties. All I know is there are six types of conciseness which are based on physical sense organs.
You asked what is "psychic, non physical sense faculties". The Buddha taught there is human eyes, there is psychic/divine eye in which you can have remote visions, see other realm beings, see where a person has been reborn after death, ( http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an05/an05.028.than.html ) and so on, and finally you have the eye of discernment that sees the ultimate true nature of reality. This is what the Buddha says:
§ 61. {Iti 3.12; Iti 52}
This was said by the Blessed One, said by the Arahant, so I have heard: "There are these three eyes. Which three? The eye of flesh, the divine eye [clairvoyance], & the eye of discernment. These are the three eyes."
The eye of flesh, the eye divine, the eye of discernment unsurpassed: these three eyes were taught by the Superlative Person. The arising of the eye of flesh is the path to the eye divine. When knowledge arises, the eye of discernment unsurpassed: whoever gains this eye is — from all suffering & stress — set free.
In the same way, there are divine/psychic ears which allows non-local hearing (you can even hear celestial music from other realm), and other 'psychic' sense faculties. It is not dependent on the flesh eyes, flesh ears, etc. In one story in the suttas, a monk fell asleep during a lecture and was reprimanded by the Buddha. He felt so guilty that he sort of stitched his eyes or something so that he will never close his eyes again. He went blind, but the Buddha taught him how to develope the Divine Eye. He was able to see again, and see much more than what normal eyes can see. I do not usually talk about these things as it can become a distraction from true practice, but its existence must be acknowledged.
Next. Ghosts have bodies, just like us. If you have the ability to see them, you'll see that they have a shape just like us (but much uglier). It is just that it is not the dense material form like us. They have eyes, etc, they can see, hear, and so on.
You have to understand that the perceivable dimension of human existence is not the only dimension there is.
For example: dogs can hear a higher range of soundwaves, and dogs cannot perceive colours. However, it is known that dogs can and do often perceive ghosts. (along with other animal species like crows). They howl at 'unseen objects' at night, become scared and frightened by them.
Likewise, what ghosts perceive is very different from what we perceive.
As Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche puts it:
Just as a person who has a 'bile' disease sees a shell as being yellow even if one can see objectively that that is not its true color, so in just the same way, as a result of the particular karmic causes of sentient beings, the various illusory visions manifest. Thus, if one were to meet a being of each of the six states of existence on the bank of the same river, they would not see that river in the same way, since they each would have different karmic causes. The beings of the hot hells would see the river as fire; those of the cold hells would see it as ice; beings of the hungry ghost realm would see the river as blood and pus; aquatic animals would see it as an environment to live in; human beings would see the river as water to drink; while the demi-gods would see it as weapons, and the gods as nectar. This shows that in reality nothing exists as concrete and objective. Therefore, understanding that the root of Samsara is truly the mind, one should set out to pull up the root. Recognizing that the mind itself is the essence of Enlightenment one attains liberation. Thus, being aware that the basis of Samsara and Nirvana is only the mind, one takes the decision to practice.
Btw, ghosts do not have 'divine eye', they have 'ghost eyes', which are somewhere between flesh eyes and divine eyes. They cannot see as much as divine eye, but they can see more than flesh eyes. Many people who develope psychic vision actually do not have divine eyes but ghost eyes: they may be aided by ghosts, or they might be a ghost from past life. More info in http://www.chan1.org/ddp/channews/10-1987.html
Not necessarily. I for once do not deny there is continuity after death and I also do not accept unverifiable speculative explanations for it which contradict what the Buddha has said. It is better to say "I don't know and it is not relevant".
Karma and rebirth is something that we have to accept as Buddhists (despite many claiming it can be discarded). This is because much of the Buddhist teachings is based on rebirth and karma.
Karma and rebirth is something that we have to accept as Buddhists (despite many claiming it can be discarded). This is because much of the Buddhist teachings is based on rebirth and karma.
I disagree. Cessation of suffeirng has nothing to do with believing in the unverifiable just because some person with "super natural psychic" powers told you so. DO is something any average person can see in this moment and practice in this moment to be free from suffering. The essence of Buddhism has nothing to do with believing in rebirth although essays that came in at later periods imply so. Belief in rebirth is, for the most part for most people, just blind faith.
Also, this divine eye you are talking about seems like just some kind of psychic power where you get to talk with the ghosts and see where your dead mother is living now etc. As far as I see it, this divine eye is a mental development which would cease to exist when the brain dies. A person with psychic powers is nothing without a fully functioning brain.
As the Buddha explained consciousness always arise based on the physical body.
Bhikkhus! Dependent on a certain cause, consciousness arises; and through that and that cause alone consciousness is called as such.
Dependent on eye and visible object, consciousness arises; then it is simply called eye-consciousness.
Dependent on ear and sound, consciousness arises; then it is simply called ear-consciousness.
Dependent on nose and odour, consciousness arises; then it is simply called nose-consciousness.
Dependent on tongue and taste, consciousness arises; then it is simply called tongue-consciousness.
Dependent on body and tangible object, consciousness arises; then it is simply called body-consciousness.
Dependent on bhavanga mind and mind-object, consciousness arises; then it is simply called mind-consciousness.
MN 38
How can "divine eye" exist without a physical body? Where in the suttas is this talked about?
I disagree. Cessation of suffeirng has nothing to do with believing in the unverifiable just because some person with "super natural psychic" powers told you so. DO is something any average person can see in this moment and practice in this moment to be free from suffering. The essence of Buddhism has nothing to do with believing in rebirth although essays that came in at later periods imply so. Belief in rebirth is, for the most part for most people, just blind faith.
Also, this divine eye you are talking about seems like just some kind of psychic power where you get to talk with the ghosts and see where your dead mother is living now etc. As far as I see it, this divine eye is a mental development which would cease to exist when the brain dies. A person with psychic powers is nothing without a fully functioning brain.
As the Buddha explained consciousness always arise based on the physical body.
MN 38
How can "divine eye" exist without a physical body? Where in the suttas is this talked about?
Notice that Buddha never mentioned 'brain' anywhere in the scriptures.
Brain is not the source of mind and consciousness.
Furthermore: he did not say consciousness must arise only when there is a physical body. This would not make sense if you consider that he taught the existence of petas (ghosts), devas (celestial beings), as well as form and formless jhana beings/Brahmas. There are beings with consciousness but no form and body at all (formless jhana beings), or they have form but no physical body (ghosts, and other celestial beings with a form that is less dense than what we consider physical) and hence cannot be seen by human/'flesh' eyes, but these 'invisible' beings have all the consciousness we have. Except for formless jhana beings, who do not have the first five consciousness, but they have the sixth. They have no forms much less a physical brain, but the sixth consciousness is alive.
Sense faculty is not the same as 'physical sense organs'. It is not confined to 'physical' as we perceive it to be.
This is a well known case that throws a challenge to modern science. It's the case of Professor John Lorber and the student with no brain.[1] Professor Lorber was a neurologist at Sheffield University who held a research chair in paediatrics. He did a lot of research on hydrocephalus, or water on the brain. The student's physician at the university noticed that the youth had a slightly larger than normal head, and so referred him to Professor Lorber, simply out of interest. When they did a brain scan on the student they saw that his cranium was filled mainly with cerebrospinal fluid. The student had an IQ of 126, had gained a first-class honours degree in mathematics, and was socially completely normal. And yet the boy had virtually no brain. This is not just a fabrication; research has found other people with no brains. During the first world war, when there was such carnage in the trenches of Europe. Soldiers had their skulls literally blown apart by bullets and shrapnel. It is said that the doctors found that some of the shattered heads of those corpses were empty. There was no brain. The evidence of those doctors was put aside as being too difficult to understand. But Professor Lorber went forward with his findings, and published them, to the great disturbance of the scientific community. Billions of dollars are going into research on the brain. Current views hold that imbalances in the brain are causing your depressions, your lack of intelligence, or your emotional problems. And yet here is evidence that shows you don't need much of a brain to have an excellent mind.
A doctor friend in Sydney discussed this case with me once. He said he'd seen those CT scans, and confirmed that the case was well known in the medical community. He explained that that boy only had what was called a reptilian brain stem. Usually, any baby born with just a reptilian brain stem, without the cortex and the other stuff, will usually die straight away or within a few days after birth. A reptilian brain stem is not capable of maintaining basic bodily functions such as breathing, heart or liver. It's not enough to keep the higher brain functions going. It's not enough for speech, not enough for intelligence, certainly not enough for being an honours student in mathematics. This doctor said, "Ajahn Brahm, you wouldn't believe the problem that this is causing in my field of science. It shatters so much past research. It is challenging so many drug companies that are making billions of dollars in profits". Because dogmatic scientists can't understand how a person with virtually no brain can be intelligent, they are just burying the findings at the back of the filing cabinet, classifying it as an anomaly. But truth just won't go away.
The Mind and the Brain
As soon as you start to include the mind, this 'ghost in the machine', in the equations, scientists tend to become discomfited. They take refuge in dogma, and say, "No, that cannot exist". I really took the Sate Astronomer to task over such dogmatism in science.
As far as Buddhism is concerned there are six senses. Not just the five senses of science, namely sight, sound, smell, taste and touch but in addition the mind. From the very beginning in Buddhism, mind has been the sixth sense. Twenty-five centuries ago, the sixth sense was well recognised. So this is not changing things to keep up with modern times; this was so from the very beginning. The sixth sense, the mind, is independent of the other five senses. In particular the mind is independent of the brain. If you volunteer to have a brain transplant with me you take my brain and I take your brain I will still be Ajahn Brahm and you will still be you. Want to try it? If it was possible and it happened, you would still be yourself. The mind and the brain are two different things. The mind can make use of the brain but it doesn't have to.
Some of you may have had out of the body experiences. These out of the body experiences have recently been the subject of mainstream scientific research. Out of the body experiences are now a scientific fact! I like to stir people up by saying things like that. Recently I saw that Dr. Sam Parnia, a researcher from the University of Southampton Medical School, has given a paper, stating that consciousness survives death.[2] He said that he did not know how it happens, or why it happens, but, he says, it does happen. His evidence was gathered from people who have had out of the body experiences in his hospital. Dr Parnia, investigated and interviewed many, many patients. The information which they gave him, as a cool headed scientist, said yes, those people were conscious during the time they were dead. What was especially very convincing was that often they could actually describe to the doctor the medical procedures that were done during the time when they were clinically dead. They could describe it as if they were looking at their body from a position above the table. But how that happens Dr. Parnia can't explain. Why it happens he can't explain. But other medical findings also support the above. Finally, their findings replicated the work done earlier by Dr. Raymond A. Moody in the United States.[3]
The evidence proved to those hard nosed doctors that out of body experiences do happen. But how could they happen? If we agree that the mind can be independent of the body, then we have a plausible explanation. The brain doesn't need to be functioning for a mind to exist. The scientific facts are there, the evidence is there, but a lot of scientists don't like to admit those facts. They prefer to close their eyes because of dogmatism.
I don't know. This was a direct copy and paste of the sutta I was referring to. I would say just mind and mind to me is existent based on the physical body. That is what's verifiable.
Furthermore: he did not say consciousness must arise only when there is a physical body. This would not make sense if you consider that he taught the existence of petas (ghosts), devas (celestial beings), as well as form and formless jhana beings/Brahmas.
Until I have seen such a being I would consider these as just mental states. Rest is mere speculation
Seems like the basis of saying consciousness exists without having the physical body as the base are the out of body experiences people have had. Considering the fact that people have these types of experiences due to many reasons like drugs, dreaming, lack of oxygen in the blood, brain damage etc it is highly speculative to consider it as a fact.
Comments
Not everyone agrees with everything that Xabir says. I actually disagree on some very important, though seemingly subtle points.
Yet, I do enjoy an amicable discussion on these points, especially with someone who is both serious and learned, not to mention gentle and well meaning. : ^ )
This is not so common as one might wish.
And:
This also gives us all a chance to reexamine what we think we know, and just possibly don’t.
Friends need not agree on every point.
But still, we are glad to see a friend any old time.
Warm Regards,
S9
X: In Buddhism, reality is like a dream but not dream. All sensations are clearly present, not a dream at all, but are at the same time impermanent, dependently originated, ungraspable - so it is LIKE a dream, but not a dream. There is a clear difference there.
S9: Are you under the opinion that in a dream things/thoughts are not impermanent, or not co-dependent, or not ungraspable?
No of course not. : ^ )
I think that you would have to agree that a thought when awake or when dreaming is still just a thought. That all thoughts, not matter the time of day, or the circumstance of their appearance are impermanent, codependent, and ungraspable, and that this efficiently describes the nature of thought, awake or sleeping.
Mind is thought, and thought is mind. These are two names for the same exact thing.
Thoughts are in the mind similar to the way that clouds are in the sky. Mind allows thoughts, and the sky allows clouds. But you cannot simply reverse this and say that clouds allow the sky, or that thoughts allow the mind, because they are not equal in this way, and besides this it would not be accurate.
Q: Look, there is a reality out there. There is something present that doesn't just vanish when you approach it.
S9: Perhaps this is because you are approaching mind objects from within the mind. Step outside of the more limited mind, and then what do you witness? Does the dream continue when you wake up as Buddha says he did? Does hypnosis continue after the hypnotist clicks his fingers? Mind has us hypnotized.
Q: Now what is present is ungraspable but it is not a nothingness.
S9: Looked at in this way, nothingness would certainly just be conceptual. But is it possible that there is a dimension of understanding beyond what mind is constantly asserting? Many have said there is, and not only that but they have witnessed this personally.
Q: Like take a mirage for instance. That is a perfect example of an actual illusion.
S9: No a mirage is an example of an illusion, within an illusion. A mirage isn’t really a lake, but it is really a mirage. Yet both of these are just two ways in which the eye perceives one mind object/event.
When you fall asleep at night, this whole present world simply falls away, just as the mirage did. Others may dream that you are lying in your bed. But for you this world or locality no longer exists. You are now in a dream within a dream.
Both of these dreams waking and sleeping are codependent, or one single cycle and support each other. If you do not think that your waking state is codependent on your sleeping state, try not sleeping for a year or two and see what happens to your sanity.
Q: Now, there is still a dependently arisen chair obviously present. Yet as is said, the chair is like an illusion because it is always changing and it has no self -substance. But, it is not actually an illusion because it isn't actually just a nothingness.
S9: Of course not, it is a dream chair, or a mental object. Dreams usually include explanations.
You must step outside of an illusion in order to see that it was an illusion. Sometimes you do this with clarity as in, “Oh, it was a mirage.” Sometimes if the whole darn thing become Clear, as it did with Buddha, you Wake Up.
Q: No, reality is very real.
S9: “Reality is real” is a tautology and actually says nothing. The question must be, “What is Ultimately Real?”
Q: It's just that mind is really all there is.
S9: How do you know this?
Q: Reality is certainly not an abstraction.
S9: How do you know this? Would a dreamer claim this of a dream from within the dream?
Q: If you kick a rock that pain you feel is not an abstraction, it is very real.
S9: It is dream pain. That old adage about a pinch not being felt by a dreamer is incorrect. Many people forget on waking just how convincing a dream is, and how realistic while it is taking place. We never even question a dream until we begin to wake up. Much like we Buddhist are beginning to question waking life.
I’ll stop here before I need to find a publisher for my book. ; ^ )
Warm Regards,
S9
It is like a river. Sometimes the river does not actually flow. There is no permament flow of water.
This is impermanent. There is no stream of consciousness. The Buddha did not teach like this.
this is all beyond me though, so i don't know!
</o>
Sometime Dhamma Dhatu (when Ive dried out a bit from this posting addiction:D) lets try and find some middle ground. Between you as Ordained Theravadin Sangha (?), and Sangha of other Buddhist traditions. So the legitamcy of all is appreciated.
And it has continuity from moment to moment, lifetime to lifetime. (those who denies this are nihilists)
It is not the continuity of a permanent entity (e.g. soul), but the continuity of a process.
It is like a dream, but yet vividly appearing, the sensation and thought itself is vivid presence of awareness. That can't be denied, just as the presence of Being/I AMness which you have felt cannot be denied. In fact even thoughts itself is a vivid presence... a thought may be illusory in the sense that it is a thought projection (like the dream world in dreaming state), or perhaps there is a visual sight of a illusory mirage, yet the vivid presence of the so called 'illusion' thought or sensation cannot be denied. Even though vividly present, it self-liberates spontaneously without a trace, and has no inherent, independent or permanent existence, hence it is LIKE an illusion but NOT an illusion.
But anyway, we must not fall under the illusion that 'all things are just mind's illusion'. The reason why we cannot say that the world is an illusion is because that would imply there is another reality APART FROM the so called 'world'. It is not like that, and Buddha never taught things that way. That is Advaita maybe, but definitely not Buddhism. There is no Brahman transcending illusory world in Buddhism. There's just the correct insights about the nature of reality, of what we call 'world'.
In Buddhism we don't wake up 'from the illusory world' to find another reality like Brahman, but we wake up 'from our illusions' (of subject-object, perceiver/perceived duality, or of self-existing and permanent self/things) to the world as it Actually is, luminous and empty.
It is better to put it this way, as my friend Longchen said:
No, no, life is not an illusion. It is dangerous to think that way. It is what you perceive of as self-existing and permanent that is an illusion. If one think that life is an illusion, one may go on to deny the things that we experience in life.
An Advaita author David Carse talks about his non-dual insight:
After the jungle, there is an intensely odd and very beau-tiful quality to the experience of life. In one sense I can only describe everything, all experience, as having a certain emptiness. This is the sense in which everything used to matter, to be vital and important, and is now seen as unreal, empty, not important, an illusion. Once it is seen that the beyond-brilliance of Sat Chit Ananda is all that is, the dream continues as a kind of shadow. Yet, at the same moment that all of what appears in the dream is experi-enced as empty, it is also seen as more deeply beautiful and perfect than ever imagined, precisely because it is not other than Sat Chit Ananda, than all that is. Everything that does not matter, that is empty illusion, is at the same time itself the beyond-brilliance, the perfect beauty. Somehow there is a balance; these two apparently opposite aspects do not cancel each other out but complement each other. This makes no 'sense,' yet it is how it is.
There is one tradition within Advaita which says that maya, the manifestation of the physical universe, is over-laid or superimposed on Sat Chit Ananda. I'm no scholar of these things, and can only attempt to describe what is seen here; and the Understanding here is that there is no question of one thing superimposed on another. Maya, the manifestation, the physical universe, is precisely Sat Chit Ananda, is not other than it, does not exist on its own as something separate to be overlaid on top of something else. This is the whole point! There is no maya! The only reason it appears to have its own reality and is commonly taken to be real in itself is because of a misperceiving, a mistaken perception which sees the appearance and not What Is. This is the meaning of Huang Po's comment that "no distinction should be made between the Absolute and the sentient world." No distinction! There is only One. There is not ever in any sense two. All perception of distinction and separation, all perception of duality, and all perception of what is known as physical reality, is mind-created illu-sion. When a teacher points at the physical world and says, "All this is maya," what is being said is that what you are seeing is illusion; what all this is is All That Is, pure Being Consciousness Bliss Outpouring; it is your perception of it as a physical world that is maya, illusion.
Regarding the analogy of sky and clouds, Thusness told me before several months back when I talked about not being fixated on thoughts and resting as sky-like awareness: Yes not to be fixated but also not to objectify the “spaciousness” otherwise “spaciousness” is no less fixated. The ‘space’ appears appealing only to a mind that abstracts but to a fully participating and involving mind, such “spaciousness” has immediately sets itself apart, distancing itself from inseparable. Emptiness is never a behind background but a fully partaking foreground manifesting as the arising and passing phenomena absence of a center. Therefore understand ‘spaciousness’ not like sky but like passing clouds and flowing water, manifesting whenever condition is. If ‘Emptiness’ has made us more fixated and immobilized this innate freedom of our non-dual luminosity, then it is ‘stubborn emptiness’.
Nevertheless, no matter what said, it is always inadequate. If we want to fully realize the inexpressible, be willing to give up all centers and point of references that manifests in the form of ‘who’, ‘when’ and ‘where’. Just give up the entire sense of self then instantly all things are spontaneously perfected.
And the Zen Patriarch Bodhidharma states: The mind’s capacity is limitless, and its conditional functions are inexhaustible. With the condition of eyes, forms are seen, With the condition of ears, sounds are heard, With the condition of nose, smells are smelled, With the condition of tongue, tastes are tasted, every movement or states are all one's Mind.
(心量广大，应用无穷，应眼见色，应耳闻声，应鼻嗅香，应舌知味，乃至施为运动，皆是自 心。)
Also you need to experience non-dual to see that sensations, thoughts, itself is Buddha-Nature. Otherwise there is just resting in background, the I AM. When non-dual insight arise, there is no resting place because all is it.
There's a lot of things we assume about thoughts, like 'it's just illusion, just a dream, blah blah' but that is just analysis. You may think that you are truly observing a thought, but you are not. First there is the direct experience of the I AM in a state of thoughtlessness, a pure presence and beingness which is vivid and undeniable, but then later the mind analyses and divides it from all other things which it labels as 'a dream'. But what is the direct experience of a thought as it ACTUALLY happens? As Thrangu Rinpoche says, there must be a naked, direct, experience of the nature of thought, as nakedly and directly without intermediary as the direct experience of the I AM. It is a vivid luminous presence that is simultaneously empty. Same goes for all other sense perceptions (which he elaborated in other chapters). Direct naked experience is not a mere dream.
As the Zen koan goes:
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Section1 {size:595.3pt 841.9pt; margin:72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt; mso-header-margin:35.4pt; mso-footer-margin:35.4pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </style><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style> <![endif]--> "Nan-ch'uan and his lay disciple Lu Hsuan (陸亘). Lu was reciting Seng-chao's saying:<o></o>
Heaven and earth come from the same root as myself:<o></o>
All things and I belong to one Whole.<o></o>
However, he did not really understand the full purport of it. Nan-ch'uan pointed at the peonies in the courtyard, saying, 'The worldlings look at these bush of flowers as in a dream." Lu did not see the point." (The Golden Age of Zen 285)<o></o><o></o>
Thrangu Rinpoche states:
From http://www.scribd.com/doc/14021456/Thrangu-RinpochePointing-Out-of-Dharmakaya-of-IX-Karmapa
....Although one recognizes the cognitive lucidity or the lucidity of awareness within emptiness, there are different ways that this might be recognized. For example, someone might find that when they look at the nature of a thought, initially the thought arises, and then as the thought dissolves, what it leaves in its wake or what it leaves behind it is an experience or recognition of the unity of cognitive lucidity and emptiness. Because this person has recognized this cognitive lucidity and emptiness, there is some degree of recognition, but because this can only occur for them or has only occurred for them after the thought has subsided or vanished, then they are still not really seeing the nature of thought itself. For someone else, they might experience that from the moment of the thought's arising, and for the entire presence of that thought, it remains a unity of cognitive lucidity and emptiness. This is a correct identification, because whenever there is a thought present in the mind or when there is no thought present in the mind, and whether or not that thought is being viewed in this way or not, the nature of the mind and the nature of every thought is always a unity of cognitive lucidity and emptiness. It is not the case that thoughts only become that as they vanish.
The word naked is used a great deal at this point in the text. And the word naked here has a very specific and important meaning because it is used to distinguish between understanding and experience, that is to say, understanding and recognition. it is very easy to confuse one's understanding for an experience or a recognition. One might understand something about the mind and therefore think that one had recognized it directly. Here, the use of the term "naked" means "direct;" that is to say, something that is experienced nakedly or directly in the sense that the experience is free from the overlay of concepts.
Whereas normally we have the attitude that thought is something we must get rid of, in this case it is made clear that it is important not to get rid of thought, but to recognize its nature, and indeed, not only the nature of thought but the nature of stillness must be recognized. In particular, with regard to thought, as long as we do not recognize its nature, of course thought poses a threat to meditation and becomes an impediment. But once the nature of thought has been correctly recognized, thought itself becomes the meditative state and therefore it is often said that "the root of meditation is recognizing the nature of thought."
There lived in the eighteenth century a great Gelugpa teacher named Changkya Rolpe Dorje, who from his early youth displayed the signs of being an extraordinary person. He became particularly learned and also very realized, and at one point he composed a song called 'Recognizing Mother.' 'Mother' in his song is the word he uses to refer to dharmata or the nature of one's mind. This song was so extraordinary that a commentary was written about it by Khenchen Mipam Rinpoche. In this song, Changkya Rolpe Dorje makes a very clear distinction between recognizing and not recognizing the nature of one's mind. In one part of the song he says, "Nowadays we scholars of the Gelugpa tradition, in discarding these appearances of the mind as the basis for the realization of emptiness and of the basis for the negation of true existence, and in searching for something beyond this to refute, something beyond this to negate in order to realize emptiness, have left our old mother behind; in other words, we have missed the point of emptiness."
Changkya Rolpe Dorje gives another image for this mistake that we tend to make. he says that we are like a small child who is sitting in his mother's lap but forgetting where he is, looks for his mother everywhere; looks above, below, left and right and is unable to see his mother and becomes quite agitated. Along comes the child's older brother, and the image the older brother represents is both the understanding of interdependence and the recognition of the nature of thought. The older brother reminds the child by saying, "Your mother is right here, you are in her lap." In the same way, the nature of our mind or emptiness is with us all the time, we tend to look for it indirectly; we look for it somewhere outside ourselves, somewhere far away. And yet we do not need to look far away if we simply view the nature of thought as it is."...
Related articles: Resolving That Thoughts and Perceptions are Buddha-Mind and Gap Between Thoughts, Thought Between Gaps
X: I am saying that in a real dream like when we fall asleep, things are illusory mind projections, whereas what I'm saying is that phenomena as we experienced it is not just an illusion. It is not all just 'thoughts' or 'imagination'.
S9: No, what else are phenomena then, besides thoughts? Don’t say Awareness, please, as we both agree that there is ‘Constant Awareness,’ but sometimes Awareness is without illusions, illusion being described as wrongful view/or wrong perspective.
When we think that Awareness is being thought, what we are saying is that Awareness cannot be without thoughts. Any advanced meditator will tell you, in a New York minute, that this simply isn’t the case. Granted thoughts cannot be without Awareness, but this is because Awareness lends temporary existence to these thoughts, not the other way around. Can you see that they are not equal in this way? Thoughts are pure imagination, just as dreams are.
X: The presence of Being/I AMness
S9: I Am is not the same thing as I-Amness, meaning a process or thought, Awareness is a Constant Presence, and thoughts/processes/actions only come and go.
X: Even thoughts itself is a vivid presence... a thought may be illusory in the sense that it is a thought projection (like the dream world in dreaming state), or perhaps there is a visual sight of a illusory mirage, yet the vivid presence of the so called 'illusion' thought or sensation cannot be denied.
S9: I do not deny that thought exists anymore than I deny that imagination exists. What I do deny is that thought has its own Essence and that thought is as Equally REAL as Awareness.
X: Even though vividly present, it self-liberates spontaneously without a trace.
S9: Thoughts liberate? I don’t think so.
Even the limited mind (or ego mind) is not liberated…it can only clarify itself, or come to an understanding of a limited kind. Mind is a perfect tool for clarifying what it Awareness isn’t.
Awareness does not become liberated either, as it was never actually captured within thought. You can turn your head in any instant are see Awareness in its full glory, whole and complete within its self. Thoughts cannot ever alter Awareness. Thought only captures thought and creates confusion within thoughts.
X: Illusion…”has no inherent, independent or permanent existence, hence it is LIKE an illusion but NOT an illusion.”
S9: Just because illusion doesn’t have its own essence and only borrows this from Awareness to exist, doesn’t mean that illusion is Not an illusion, anymore than a unicorn is real because it borrows thought or imagination. Obviously a unicorn is a product of our IMAGINATION. Is it not? This world is a unicorn.
Warm Regards,
S9
there are 8 layers of consciousness,
and the trikaya is also means the 3 different layers of the mind
the confusion above in this tread , is basically each has different understanding on the meaning of mind due to different level of teaching
It is not easy for the zenist to explain mind because they basically speak from the absolute level, and they do not have engage themselve in abhidharma(kosha) type of analysis ground work in their teaching.
A: The confusion above in this thread, is basically each has different understanding on the meaning of mind due to different level of teaching.
S9: This is possibly true, however rather than levels of teachings, I think I would call it depths of understanding. I don’t believe this is a trivial distinction, as when we look more deeply at the very same thing, it is layers of mind that fall away and leave us eventually with the purist understanding, or Awake.
Warm Regards,
S9
This is a doctrine in Japanese Buddhism known as honjaku (?) or "original enlightenment", that was popular in Tendai Buddhism originally, but sometimes influenced other schools that derived from Tendai (especially Zen). Other Tendai-based schools like the Pure Land schools and Nichiren schools did not subscribe to this view.
1. No.
2. Most of them do actually. Mahayana Buddhism (including Zen) tradtionally sees the Buddhist path as extremely long (3 asamkhya kalpas or something like that), and the Bodhisattva Path has 10 stages in most texts, sometimes 42. Esoteric Buddhism tends to view these as symbolic, not literal, but we're talking about Mahayana at the moment.
3. No, I would be very surprised if you found one. There are teachings in things like the Lankavatara about the potential for Enlightenment (womb of Buddhahood, etc), but not necessarily being a Buddha. These are two different things.
advance Mahayana talks about attainting Buddhahood in one's life time, but they are based on the principle an odinary men when awaken is known as a buddha, while deluded is known as common mortal. They view that all Buddhas named in scriptures are all provisional Buddhas ( skillful means ) with the intented wisdom to guide the common man to enter the dharma gate. Hence the statement of there are no Buddha outside the mind, or the common people ( buddha nature ) themselve are the actual Buddha to be awaken.
which match with the Mahayana statement of the mind, the living beings and the Thus Come One are without distinction ( from the absolute perspective )
Awareness is not a tree or a thought in the sense that Awareness obviously is not objective like a 'thing' existing 'outside' separate from us. In fact, nothing exists 'outside', as explained earlier:
"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
In actuality no sound, no thought, no perception, is actually an objective reality. They are only Mind, or Awareness, they do not exist outside. There is no objectively existing tree or a thought. The notion of sensations and perceptions having objectivity is really just an illusory mental construct. Seeing through this mental construct, one dissolves everything into just one whole field of experiential reality. The self-manifestations commonly known as 'objects' aren't really 'outer objects' but are rather perceptions arising and vanishing momentarily in/as this One Mind, so that cannot form an identity of sorts. Since there is no objective reality to begin with, Awareness cannot be identified with any objects. However one who experiences One Mind is also different from the I AM stage since the One Mind is not purely Subjective Reality like a Subject behind all things, rather one experiences non-dual with everything perceived/experienced, one whole experiential field in which subject and object are inseparably incorporated. There is no more sense of 'distance' between awareness and objects, perceiver and perceived, for the very substance of all sensations/perceptions IS Awareness. Awareness is the very substance of the entire experiential field, not an observer observing it. There is no Awareness inside and objects outside, there is just Oneness appearing as sights, sounds, thoughts, etc.
At this stage it's seen nothing exists outside of or apart from Mind/Awareness, so all is just manifestation of the One Mind and is none other than It, so you dissolve all dharmas (notions of objectivity) into One Mind. Many Advaitins do eventually reach this stage.
So the first step is seeing the falsity of the division between Mind and phenomena, giving rise to non-dual insight or One Mind. However, there will still be some remaining notions of the One Mind as something permanent and independent. There must be insight into 'how' Mind and phenomena actually co-arise - there isn't a sense of Mind as a Source, and phenomena arising out of, or within, or being part of, this One Mind. Phenomena actually has no beginning and end, and therefore we cannot say phenomena began and originated or ended from/within a permanent Source. All these are false notions which are also dependent on notion of time, an illusory construct.
The notion of One Mind as permanent as opposed to things beginning and ending in time, the notion of Mind being the source of appearances coming and going within this One Source, are all false views, and are all the views of inherency. Time, beginning, end, and an origin/Source, etc are all false views. One must see all these are just more illusory mental constructs in the same way as 'objectivity' is, there must be an arising insight that burns away these views. If we see that mind is not the 'source of phenomena', then we realise there is just phenomena, sensations and perceptions which are all 'mind', but without an independent, permanent, substratum, essence or Source. There is no temporal existence beginning and ending, arising from and then subsiding back 'in' Mind, since mind and phenomena (can't even be separated) have 'both' existed since beginningless 'time', there is no One Mind being the first cause, no Mind being permanent vs phenomena being temporal (having beginning and end) -- can't even be divided in the subtlest way -- there is just one co-arising without subject and object division, just phenomena/mind. All phenomena are timeless and without origin. There is just mind, but not a permanent independent mind/source, but mind as transient phenomena itself, without beginning or end, without time. One then understands what Zen Master Dogen mean by 'Impermanence is Buddha-Nature'. When Zen Master Dogen said Impermanence, he was very clear that his Impermanence is Timeless Impermanence, not temporal existence existing against a permanent background (I AM), nor a permanent undivided One Mind. And yes Awareness is ever-present but not a dead ever-presence but a dynamic ever-presencing as the flow/transience. Not Awareness, more like 'Awaring'. When there is insight into BOTH non-dual + anatta, there is no more referencing back into something permanent and independent, instead there is complete affirmation of transience. There is no more desync of view with (nondual) experience, no more dualising of Absolute and relative, absolutely no divisions.
There is no inherently existing or permanent 'Awareness' entity, just these sensations and perceptions and thoughts which are not objective, but not subjective, either. No awareness not as in 'dead' but no awareness as a metaphysical essence or observer of things.
There is no inherently existing or permanent 'Awareness' entity, just these sensations and perceptions and thoughts which are not objective, but not subjective, either. No awareness not as in 'dead' but no awareness as a metaphysical essence or observer of things or the ultimate source of all things. Everything is a radiant expression of itself, and not a manifestation of some One Mind or Source. The expression itself is mind/awareness, not expression 'OF' but expression 'as'.
I think Richard Herman wrote that previously:
Yes, it is the absolute "elimination of the background" without remainder. It is the affirmation of multiplicity, not dispersion, but multiplicity. The world references nothing but the world. Each thing is radiant expression of itself. There is no support, no ground. No awareness. No awareness.
"All dharmas are resolved in One Mind. One Mind resolves into...."
There is the radiant world. just the radiant world. No awareness.
That is the Abbott slapping floor with his hand. The red floor is red. Spontaneous function.
There is no question of whether Awareness depends on thoughts when there is no independent, permanent entity, or separate 'Awareness' to begin with. When one experiences non-duality, one knows that awareness isn't separate from thoughts and phenomena. Next, one must realise that there is no 'awareness' as the source in/from which phenomena arise and subside, there is no source, time, beginning and end, independence, permanence, just phenomena. There is just whatever arise according to conditions, dependent origination. There is nothing subjective, nor objective. There is just whatever happens. 'Abbot slapping floor with his hand. The red floor is red. Spontaneous function.' Then, you will also understand why the Buddha in the Nikaya or Theravada Buddhism is able to talk about awareness without making it something more ultimate than the transient mind -- he never capitalize 'Awareness', he only described dharmas, phenomena, but that all sensations are self-luminous or aware where it is is automatically implied since there is no duality of perceiver and perceived nor any notion of any inherent self nor an ultimate source in his teachings. In other words in the seen just the seen, in the heard just the heard, there is no hearer/seer/etc.
Guru Padmasambhava says:<o>
</o> "The mind that observes is also devoid of an ego or self-entity.
It is neither seen as something different from the aggregates
Nor as identical with these five aggregates.
If the first were true, there would exist some other substance.
This is not the case, so were the second true,
That would contradict a permanent self, since the aggregates are impermanent.
Therefore, based on the five aggregates,
The self is a mere imputation based on the power of the ego-clinging.
As to that which imputes, the past thought has vanished and is nonexistent.
The future thought has not occurred, and the present thought does not withstand scrutiny."<o></o>
So 'no awareness' does not really mean no awareness, but no ultimate identity (whether Objective nor Subjective nor Integrated), Self, subject-object division, nor essence, permanence, independence, etc. to awareness. Neither am I saying that thoughts have its own essence. Thoughts, like trees, do not have essence nor objective reality. They are all just Mind only, but Mind also has no independent or permanent reality. Mind is Luminous, Vivid, but Empty, and cannot be spoken of as an entity apart from phenomena. Viewed correctly, whatever arise, is Mind, but also there is no independent/permanent Mind as a source of arising, Mind too is empty (of self-existing independence, permanence, etc). When we say thought is Awareness, I don't mean Awareness as an unchanging entity (awareness is empty), but Awareness as a point of luminous clarity, as a manifestation.
So the Third Karmapa wrote:
Through the examination of external objects we see the mind, not the objects.
Through the examination of the mind we see its empty essence, but not the mind.
Through the examination of both, attachment to duality disappears by itself.
May the clear light, the true essence of mind, be recognized.
.........
Self-manifestation, which has never existed as such, is erroneously seen as an object.
Through ignorance, self-awareness is mistakenly experienced as an I.
Through attachment to this duality we are caught in the conditioned world.
May the root of confusion be found. We have to understand that liberation is understood different according to one's insight.
Firstly, when Awareness is understood dualistically, as Subject opposed to Object, liberation consists of detaching Subject from Object. This is called Disassociation. One disassociate from all objects to 'enter' Pure Subject, and so freedom/liberation is the 'freedom from' the pain of finite objects, as Ken Wilber said: "With this discovery… you are halfway home. You have disidentified from any and all finite objects; you rest as infinite Consciousness. You are free, open, empty, clear, radiant, released, liberated, exalted, drenched in a blissful emptiness that exists prior to space, prior to time, prior to tears and terror, prior to pain and mortality and suffering and death. You have found the great Unborn, the vast Abyss, the unqualifiable Ground of all that is, and all that was, and all that ever shall be."
And Longchen said: Just my opinion only,
I think Eckhart Tolle may have been suffering alot and suddenly he 'let go' of trying to work out his problems. This results in a dissociation from thoughts which give rise to the experience of Presence.
To me, 'I AM' is an experience of Presence, it is just that only one aspect of Presence is experienced which is the 'all-pervading' aspect. The non-dual and emptiness aspect are not experienced.. Because non-dual is not realised (at I AM stage), a person may still use effort in an attempt to 'enter' the Presence. This is because, at the I AM stage, there is an erroneous concept that there is a relative world make up of thoughts AND there is an 'absolute source' that is watching it. The I AM stage person will make attempts to 'dissociated from the relative world' in order to enter the 'absolute source'.
However, at Non-dual (& further..) stage understanding, one have understood that the division into a relative world and an absolute source has NEVER occcured and cannot be... Thus no attempt/effort is truly required.
But as Ken Wilber said, that is just halfway, not the full insight into the true nature of Awareness, but just an initial glimpse of Awareness's luminosity. At this stage Awareness is still understood dualistically, and liberation consists of 'disassociation'.
The next step is the insight of non-duality which Ken Wilber too describes well later in his article, in which there is no more attempt to disassociate. However there are many levels or depths of non-dual insight. At first there will be inherent view of Awareness as the substance, but one will not disassociate, one will experience all sensations to be the substance of Awareness itself without division of perceiver and perceived. But there is no clarity of view.
One must have further insight into Anatta, one is freed from the bonds of inherency and duality, there is deep insight into what is 'always and already so', or in Dzogchen where the term 'self-liberation' originated, 'spontaneously self-perfected' -- always already, all arising are by nature luminous and empty, non-dual, anatta, empty, but we mistaken it as dualistic and inherent. It is the deeply rooted wrong view that shapes and distorts experience that causes all problems.
So at the moment when you see that all arising are by nature non-dual and empty, whatever is experienced: sounds, thoughts, sensations, everything just self-liberates on its own accord. Phenomena are always already arising and subsiding, but once self-liberation is experienced, phenomena arise and subside like drawing on pond and leaves no traces, there is no grasping. Best part is that NO EFFORT is required to disassociate from phenomena (when there is no source behind, what is there to dis-associate?) or maintain any state in order to liberate, the only problem is our inherent and dualistic views. But if we see with our entire body/mind/soul that all sensations and phenomena are by nature luminous and empty, they spontaneously self-liberate effortlessly. But if we view them dualistically and inherently, that is bondage. In Thusness words, "it is not negative feelings is already liberated... all sort of nonsense". And it is not that there is nothing to do as in the case of Advaita Vedanta. They missed the importance of dissolving the views and how it relates to true liberation. In Buddhism one must see how ignorance is the cause of suffering and how wrong views shape our experience. It is the wrong view that causes psychological and spiritual pain, and at any moment there is wrong view, you will experience suffering. Practice is thus dynamic to see such tendencies arise moment to moment. Yet even after liberation, sour is still sour, pain is still pain, whatever arise according to conditions cannot be denied, yet simultaneously there is no suffering.
And as Thusness wrote before... http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/search/label/Zen%20Patriarch%20Bodhidharma
It is important to know that mind is itself liberation. That is why knowing the nature of our mind is the way of liberation. If Liberation is not experienced, then the clarity is still not there. There is no true understanding of what mind is.
Liberation is this Pristine Awareness itself in its natural state. That is why understanding this Pristine Awareness is the direct path towards liberation. If we cannot see that the 5 aggregates are themselves our Buddha Nature, then we will not understand there is nothing to shunt from the transience. Thought liberates, sound liberates, tastes liberates. The transience liberates. If we do not see that, then we are taking a gradual path. It is also not advisable to speak too much about spontaneous arising or self liberation. It can be quite misleading.
Anyway this post is a good read and is related, Reflection and Presence: The Dialectic of Awakening What is illusion is the sense of a truly existing 'me' perceiving a truly existing 'object'.
For example if we imagine a unicorn and think that it is truly existing, that is an illusion.
If we imagine a unicorn, but does not treat that as truly existing, then it is just a thought but not an illusion. We are not under the illusion of it as truly existing.
Thoughts, sight, vision, they arise and subside but are not illusion. Thought is a vivid luminous presence and is empty/ungraspable, but is not an illusion, it is undeniably present and vivid as awareness. It is our view of subject and object duality, perceiver and perceived, or viewing things 'inherently', self-existing and permanent that is illusion.
The world (there is no world in the objective sense anyway, just one field of experiential reality) btw, is not just made of thoughts. Stop thinking, you still spontaneously hear, see, smell, taste, touch. And anyway I won't even say that thoughts are illusions. Thought is just as it is, it is our clinging to them as objective, real, permanent, existing, etc that is illusion.
Lets not stink of premature claims to know Buddhanature. That should be a cause for mouthwash.
Q: Liberation is this Pristine Awareness itself in its natural state. That is why understanding this Pristine Awareness is the direct path towards liberation.
S9: I am going to address your whole post. But, please tell me this. How can you write these words, and then turn around and say there is no Awareness. This confuses me.
Thanx,
S9
Neither does anything arise that is not dependant.
Do you mean to imply that the only difference between Nirvana and Samsara is just a change of attitude?
Respectfully,
S9
Q: I think it is better to approach this way:
Non-conceptual thought VS conceptual thought instead of Awareness VS Thoughts.
S9: I don’t see why. Conceptual and non-conceptual thoughts are still just thoughts, whereas Awareness is not a thought. I think what we are trying to get at here is, what is Awareness. Are we not?
Q: If you see it is “Awareness Vs Thoughts,” then it is dualistic and inherent view. If you see it as non-conceptual thought, then eventually you will realize both non-conceptual and conceptual thoughts share the same luminous essence and empty nature.
S9: Since the reason that Awareness is called empty, in the first place, is because it is actually empty of thoughts. Why then would we be trying to say that Awareness and thoughts are the same exact thing? Awareness is more like the ocean, and thoughts are more like waves in the ocean. these waves come up and going down, but without any personal essence outside of what the ocean lends to them temporarily. These waves are much like what dreams are.
Q: Non-conceptual thought is non-verbal and direct. It appears still and with the tendency to reify it is often mistaken as ‘Unchanging Witness.’
S9: Indeed, confusion may bring this about. But, Pure Awareness is not the part of the mind, which is often called “Unchanging Witness.”
Q: Therefore in your experience of the “I AMness”, I advise you to understand this experience from the perspective of “direct and non-conceptual aspect of perception.”
S9: I do. But this perception is fully Aware of Awareness only. It manifests in the mind as Presence.
Q: …how by being “direct and non-conceptual” creates that sort of ‘certain, unshakable and undeniable’ confidence.
S9: Exactly.
Pure Being is too immediate and direct to lend itself to thought. Of this I am confident and certain. I Am is Pure Immediate Being.Thoughts, on the other hand, are constantly becoming.
Q: Awareness is not a tree or a thought in the sense that Awareness obviously is not objective like a 'thing' existing 'outside' separate from us. In fact, nothing exists 'outside', as explained earlier.
S9: Isn’t that what I have been saying all along?
Q: "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
S9: If Awareness were not present, there would be no forest, and therefore no tree to fall, let alone an ear to hear it. This world is not a dream that proceeds unattended. But it is the dream ear that hears the dream tree fall, within Awareness/Presence, as Awareness is omnipresent. And yet, Awareness is neither thoughts, nor senses, nor material objects. All three of these are imagination only.
Q: What David Carse said requires more than the “I AMness” realization you narrated in your post “Certainty of Being.”
S9: But, I am certain of Being. In fact, Pure Being ‘IS’ all that I am certain of.
Q: It also requires more than just glimpses of the non-dual state that can be induced by penetrating the question.
S9: I am not glimpsing the non-dual state. It has come to stay and NEVER goes away.
Q: At this phase, non-dual becomes quite effortless.
S9: Why would it take effort to look right at it and see it directly? It is everywhere I look.
Warm Regards,
S9
The suttas teach a gradual path based on the Noble 8-fold Path. The root cause of suffering is ignorance and I don't see how it makes any sense to say that we're ignorant and enlightened at the same time.
P
no. not in the pali canon
ascent? to say that the unconditioned doesn't give rise to itself. that's why the buddha had teachings. that's why he taught the eightfold path.
suttas? no. sutras? there's a sutra about every magical thing.
P: The suttas teach a gradual path based on the Noble 8-fold Path. The root cause of suffering is ignorance and I don't see how it makes any sense to say that we're ignorant and enlightened at the same time.
S9: The ignorance is that we think we are the mind, and/or our identification with the mind. Mind is ignorant of the fact that we are not the mind, and never was the mind, and that what we call Pure Awareness or Enlightenment is who we are, and have always been, (AKA the Buddha Nature).
So in fact, we are not both ignorant and enlightened. Mind is imagining that it is ignorant and that it is the mind. We are not the mind, so we cannot count that as one of our selves. Is a mistaken view anything more than simply a mistake? Seen rightly, the mistaken view melts away.
Can we than say we are both the mistaken view AND our Ultimate True Being?
Warm Regards,
S9
M: “…to say that the unconditioned doesn't give rise to itself.”
S9: I wonder if I could get you to elucidate a bit more on this statement.
Thanx,
S9
Thanks, this looks to be interesting. : ^ )
Friendly regards,
S9
The Buddha explained six types of consciousness.
Eye-consciousness
Ear-consciousness
....
Mind-consciousness
There cannot be an eye-consciousness without an eye. The eye should make contact with a form for eye-consciousness to rise. It is the initial cognition. So would you explain how consciousness arise without a physical body please?</consciousness>
These poor translations and poor investigations are the likely cause of the tiresome and endlessly frivolous "rebirth" debate.
Beyond that (because I am human), you may have to ask a peta (hungry ghost)
Just understand that 'sense organs' does not mean 'physical'. In fact it should be better termed 'faculty' than 'organ'. It could be psychic, non-physical sense faculties.
It would be a physicalist and annihilationist view to see all conditions and manifestation as merely physical. This is not accepted in Buddhism.
Neither am I however, suggesting an eternalist view. All these are extremes.
The consciousness is "reborn" moment to moment explanation is very limited and limiting if you ask me.
I am in no position to claim insight into a definitive interpretation. I just know that the moment to moment idea is not it.
It seems to me that if you are not in a position to declare, “what is,” then you certainly cannot with any integrity declare, out of hand, “what isn’t.” You can only say that this is how it seems to me, “so far,” otherwise you are simply borrowing someone else’s wisdom.
Warm Regards,
S9
Such a long text... Most of the text is suggesting that since so and so had "out of body"/"near-death" experience and "floating body"
:crazy:
You are implying that it is safe to go by the word of those "extra-ordinary" people who have had out of body experiences despise what the Buddha has said in the suttas over and over again that conciseness arises and ceases based on the physical sense organs.
Where are those hungry ghosts? Have you seen any? For me it is just a mental state which is verifiable
I will understand it if you provide me a good enough explanation. So please tell me what those "psychic, non-physical sense faculties" are how conciseness arise based on those said faculties. All I know is there are six types of conciseness which are based on physical sense organs.
Not necessarily. I for once do not deny there is continuity after death and I also do not accept unverifiable speculative explanations for it which contradict what the Buddha has said. It is better to say "I don't know and it is not relevant".
He said sense faculties, he did not say it must be 'physical'. Yes, I have seen ghost and have no doubt of their existence.
Petas, or hungry ghosts, can be of many kinds. I just posted in http://newbuddhist.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5837 You asked what is "psychic, non physical sense faculties". The Buddha taught there is human eyes, there is psychic/divine eye in which you can have remote visions, see other realm beings, see where a person has been reborn after death, ( http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an05/an05.028.than.html ) and so on, and finally you have the eye of discernment that sees the ultimate true nature of reality. This is what the Buddha says:
§ 61. {Iti 3.12; Iti 52}
This was said by the Blessed One, said by the Arahant, so I have heard: "There are these three eyes. Which three? The eye of flesh, the divine eye [clairvoyance], & the eye of discernment. These are the three eyes."
The eye of flesh, the eye divine, the eye of discernment unsurpassed: these three eyes were taught by the Superlative Person. The arising of the eye of flesh is the path to the eye divine. When knowledge arises, the eye of discernment unsurpassed: whoever gains this eye is — from all suffering & stress — set free.
In the same way, there are divine/psychic ears which allows non-local hearing (you can even hear celestial music from other realm), and other 'psychic' sense faculties. It is not dependent on the flesh eyes, flesh ears, etc. In one story in the suttas, a monk fell asleep during a lecture and was reprimanded by the Buddha. He felt so guilty that he sort of stitched his eyes or something so that he will never close his eyes again. He went blind, but the Buddha taught him how to develope the Divine Eye. He was able to see again, and see much more than what normal eyes can see. I do not usually talk about these things as it can become a distraction from true practice, but its existence must be acknowledged.
Next. Ghosts have bodies, just like us. If you have the ability to see them, you'll see that they have a shape just like us (but much uglier). It is just that it is not the dense material form like us. They have eyes, etc, they can see, hear, and so on.
You have to understand that the perceivable dimension of human existence is not the only dimension there is.
For example: dogs can hear a higher range of soundwaves, and dogs cannot perceive colours. However, it is known that dogs can and do often perceive ghosts. (along with other animal species like crows). They howl at 'unseen objects' at night, become scared and frightened by them.
Likewise, what ghosts perceive is very different from what we perceive.
As Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche puts it:
Just as a person who has a 'bile' disease sees a shell as being yellow even if one can see objectively that that is not its true color, so in just the same way, as a result of the particular karmic causes of sentient beings, the various illusory visions manifest. Thus, if one were to meet a being of each of the six states of existence on the bank of the same river, they would not see that river in the same way, since they each would have different karmic causes. The beings of the hot hells would see the river as fire; those of the cold hells would see it as ice; beings of the hungry ghost realm would see the river as blood and pus; aquatic animals would see it as an environment to live in; human beings would see the river as water to drink; while the demi-gods would see it as weapons, and the gods as nectar. This shows that in reality nothing exists as concrete and objective. Therefore, understanding that the root of Samsara is truly the mind, one should set out to pull up the root. Recognizing that the mind itself is the essence of Enlightenment one attains liberation. Thus, being aware that the basis of Samsara and Nirvana is only the mind, one takes the decision to practice.
Btw, ghosts do not have 'divine eye', they have 'ghost eyes', which are somewhere between flesh eyes and divine eyes. They cannot see as much as divine eye, but they can see more than flesh eyes. Many people who develope psychic vision actually do not have divine eyes but ghost eyes: they may be aided by ghosts, or they might be a ghost from past life. More info in http://www.chan1.org/ddp/channews/10-1987.html Karma and rebirth is something that we have to accept as Buddhists (despite many claiming it can be discarded). This is because much of the Buddhist teachings is based on rebirth and karma.
I disagree. Cessation of suffeirng has nothing to do with believing in the unverifiable just because some person with "super natural psychic" powers told you so. DO is something any average person can see in this moment and practice in this moment to be free from suffering. The essence of Buddhism has nothing to do with believing in rebirth although essays that came in at later periods imply so. Belief in rebirth is, for the most part for most people, just blind faith.
Also, this divine eye you are talking about seems like just some kind of psychic power where you get to talk with the ghosts and see where your dead mother is living now etc. As far as I see it, this divine eye is a mental development which would cease to exist when the brain dies. A person with psychic powers is nothing without a fully functioning brain.
As the Buddha explained consciousness always arise based on the physical body.
MN 38
How can "divine eye" exist without a physical body? Where in the suttas is this talked about?
What is bhavanga mind?
Brain is not the source of mind and consciousness.
Furthermore: he did not say consciousness must arise only when there is a physical body. This would not make sense if you consider that he taught the existence of petas (ghosts), devas (celestial beings), as well as form and formless jhana beings/Brahmas. There are beings with consciousness but no form and body at all (formless jhana beings), or they have form but no physical body (ghosts, and other celestial beings with a form that is less dense than what we consider physical) and hence cannot be seen by human/'flesh' eyes, but these 'invisible' beings have all the consciousness we have. Except for formless jhana beings, who do not have the first five consciousness, but they have the sixth. They have no forms much less a physical brain, but the sixth consciousness is alive.
Sense faculty is not the same as 'physical sense organs'. It is not confined to 'physical' as we perceive it to be.
(Ajahn Brahmavamso)
The Boy with No Brain
This is a well known case that throws a challenge to modern science. It's the case of Professor John Lorber and the student with no brain.[1] Professor Lorber was a neurologist at Sheffield University who held a research chair in paediatrics. He did a lot of research on hydrocephalus, or water on the brain. The student's physician at the university noticed that the youth had a slightly larger than normal head, and so referred him to Professor Lorber, simply out of interest. When they did a brain scan on the student they saw that his cranium was filled mainly with cerebrospinal fluid. The student had an IQ of 126, had gained a first-class honours degree in mathematics, and was socially completely normal. And yet the boy had virtually no brain. This is not just a fabrication; research has found other people with no brains. During the first world war, when there was such carnage in the trenches of Europe. Soldiers had their skulls literally blown apart by bullets and shrapnel. It is said that the doctors found that some of the shattered heads of those corpses were empty. There was no brain. The evidence of those doctors was put aside as being too difficult to understand. But Professor Lorber went forward with his findings, and published them, to the great disturbance of the scientific community. Billions of dollars are going into research on the brain. Current views hold that imbalances in the brain are causing your depressions, your lack of intelligence, or your emotional problems. And yet here is evidence that shows you don't need much of a brain to have an excellent mind.
A doctor friend in Sydney discussed this case with me once. He said he'd seen those CT scans, and confirmed that the case was well known in the medical community. He explained that that boy only had what was called a reptilian brain stem. Usually, any baby born with just a reptilian brain stem, without the cortex and the other stuff, will usually die straight away or within a few days after birth. A reptilian brain stem is not capable of maintaining basic bodily functions such as breathing, heart or liver. It's not enough to keep the higher brain functions going. It's not enough for speech, not enough for intelligence, certainly not enough for being an honours student in mathematics. This doctor said, "Ajahn Brahm, you wouldn't believe the problem that this is causing in my field of science. It shatters so much past research. It is challenging so many drug companies that are making billions of dollars in profits". Because dogmatic scientists can't understand how a person with virtually no brain can be intelligent, they are just burying the findings at the back of the filing cabinet, classifying it as an anomaly. But truth just won't go away.
The Mind and the Brain
As soon as you start to include the mind, this 'ghost in the machine', in the equations, scientists tend to become discomfited. They take refuge in dogma, and say, "No, that cannot exist". I really took the Sate Astronomer to task over such dogmatism in science.
As far as Buddhism is concerned there are six senses. Not just the five senses of science, namely sight, sound, smell, taste and touch but in addition the mind. From the very beginning in Buddhism, mind has been the sixth sense. Twenty-five centuries ago, the sixth sense was well recognised. So this is not changing things to keep up with modern times; this was so from the very beginning. The sixth sense, the mind, is independent of the other five senses. In particular the mind is independent of the brain. If you volunteer to have a brain transplant with me you take my brain and I take your brain I will still be Ajahn Brahm and you will still be you. Want to try it? If it was possible and it happened, you would still be yourself. The mind and the brain are two different things. The mind can make use of the brain but it doesn't have to.
Some of you may have had out of the body experiences. These out of the body experiences have recently been the subject of mainstream scientific research. Out of the body experiences are now a scientific fact! I like to stir people up by saying things like that. Recently I saw that Dr. Sam Parnia, a researcher from the University of Southampton Medical School, has given a paper, stating that consciousness survives death.[2] He said that he did not know how it happens, or why it happens, but, he says, it does happen. His evidence was gathered from people who have had out of the body experiences in his hospital. Dr Parnia, investigated and interviewed many, many patients. The information which they gave him, as a cool headed scientist, said yes, those people were conscious during the time they were dead. What was especially very convincing was that often they could actually describe to the doctor the medical procedures that were done during the time when they were clinically dead. They could describe it as if they were looking at their body from a position above the table. But how that happens Dr. Parnia can't explain. Why it happens he can't explain. But other medical findings also support the above. Finally, their findings replicated the work done earlier by Dr. Raymond A. Moody in the United States.[3]
The evidence proved to those hard nosed doctors that out of body experiences do happen. But how could they happen? If we agree that the mind can be independent of the body, then we have a plausible explanation. The brain doesn't need to be functioning for a mind to exist. The scientific facts are there, the evidence is there, but a lot of scientists don't like to admit those facts. They prefer to close their eyes because of dogmatism.
I don't know. This was a direct copy and paste of the sutta I was referring to. I would say just mind and mind to me is existent based on the physical body. That is what's verifiable.
Until I have seen such a being I would consider these as just mental states. Rest is mere speculation