Apech

Glad to see this thread is staying on topic ... which is ... er summer sausages I think ... not sure ... actually spectacles, squirrels, summer, sausages ... I'm beginning to see the pattern! the letter s.

yes, Nun (or Nu) is the void. The sky is the void with a 't' added Nut ... which signifies female ... as in the word for king is nesu and queen nesut ... so adding a 't' makes it female. Both Geb (the earth) and Nut (the sky) are form by Shu the air from their 'mother' called Tefnut. The word (i)tef means father and Nut can mean mother. So the origin of the sky and earth is the Father-mother ... which is the void seen as a primordial substance. As the created world is like a bubble within the infinite Nun there is a surface or skin between this bubble of air and the waters of the void. This skin is the sky. If you imagine that the world as we know it, the known, is within this bubble, then the known has an outermost limit. Again this is the sky. It becomes then a bit like a projection screen on which images can appear in their most insubstantial from. Like a movie images are nothing but projected light ... it looks like there are people, cars and so on but it is just pure forms with no substance. So Nut is like this, the limit of perception which shows us pure forms. If you think about the sky that we perceive you can see how literal this explanation is. The blue sky does not exist as a substantial thing, you can't fly up in a space shuttle and touch it, there is nothing there. All it is, is the blue light from the sun scattered and refracted down to us, in the early morning or evening the angles are such that we see not blue but red or orange .... but its all just a light effect. At night it looks like a black surface with lights (stars) upon it. So we have at the outermost edge of our perception as kind of surface or mirror perhaps which reflects pure form back to us. In our own minds we can perceive also a kind of surface at the outermost limit of our perception, a boundary which has no substance but allows us to think, have ideas, see images that have no actual substantial counterpart. Nowadays we are told that these things, images, dreams, pure ideas, are not 'real', that the only thing that is real is the gross material world of compacted form i.e. Geb the earth. But to the Egyptians what is real is the world created by the separation of subtle from gross by the intelligent power (Shu), they are all real Nut, Shu,Geb, they depend on each other to exist and arise through each other. You can't choose to just have Geb and be a materialist, and you can't chose to just live in your dreams and imagination and be a Nutist. All three = the real. If this distinction between them fails, then Nut merges with Geb and the Nun dissolves everything back into the void.

Hi vortex, breath of life is a reasonable meaning ... or just life ... the symbol is composed of a female part (the circle bit) and male part (line) and therefore 'life' is sexual energy. sexual interfunction but not necessarily actual sex implied but more this energy of excitement which is universal. We can discuss how this works later perhaps.

any questions? ... like why? what? and so on?

Why don't they fix it?is it difficult?

There may be a significant number who think this but there's also a vocal minority (?) who want more or less no moderation. When I used to do it I tried my best to moderate as little as I could ... to let things flow ...

... what's a memory leak? (In idiot proof language if possible)

I'd rather use Firefox but it makes the processor on my 6 year old macbook go to max temp and the fan buzzes like its going to burst ... so I switched to chrome which seems quicker and uses much less processing power.

Cocky comedy ... that's about right.

Well human figures with animal heads are common in the ancient world ... look at Egypt. They are also common feature of shamanic visions as are serpents ... so I would guess that is where all this is coming from ...

How would we ever get to squirrels in spectacles if this rule was in force? I don't see the problem to be honest ... if people want to get back on topic all they have to do is start posting on topic and ignore the others ... these little detours don't always last that long. the problem only is serious if someone deliberately and repeatedly derails the topic for no purpose other than to distract and make mayhem ... then a potentially interesting subject gets' swamped ... in this case the mods can split and pit of whatever ...

Didn't realise they had topless bathing in old Iraq.

This is the Twelfth Hour of the Book of Gates, one of the Egyptian New Kingdom books of the Duat. It illustrates the sun rise. You can see the waters of Nun (the abyss) as the wavy lines that cover the background. This is the Egyptian letter 'n' - which means water. But they were not talking about physical water, but of Nun. Nun is said to have four qualities, two of which we have already mentioned, hidden-ness and water. Water is best understood as meaning fluidity. We can add to these infinity and darkness. The Nun is infinite, it has no limits or boundaries. It is also dark, it has no light. But this is not the darkness of obscuration but rather the darkness of complete transparency, like outer space because there is nothing to scatter the light it appears dark. These four qualities were personified as eight male and female deities called the Ogdoad. That is male and female water, male and female darkness and so on. Although the Nun is non-being, it is not part of existence as such, it is potentially seething with life like a great ocean. It is the power-source of everything that is to be, without partaking of that existence. This is why it is the background to creation. Tot eh Egyptians every sun rise was a recapitulation of the the First Time act of creation of the universe. So as well as illustrating the sun rise this picture illustrates that creation too. The Nun is personified as the large figure at the bottom which is holding up the sun boat. This is the boat of the sun god, a boat being the vehicle of choice in Ancient Egypt. Today we might give hm a Rolls Royce or a millionaire's yacht. In the sun boat is the crew of the sun god, a group of gods who are assisting him in his journey. On either side of the large scarab beetle, Khepera, are the two sister goddesses Isis and Nephthys. Although Isis herself in late periods developed into a kind of universal mother goddess here she is paired with her 'sister' and represent two phases of the cycling of energy. Isis, up ward movement, light and growth and Nephthys downward movement, darkness and death. The sun disk itself is shown above being pushed along by the beetle Khepera, the motive transformative energy, so this is really a way fo saying that the sun drives itself and does not rely on an external power. Above the sun disk is another circle formed by the body of the god of the dead Osiris. The circle of his body forms the limits of the Duat, or underworld from which the sun has just emerged. This re-enforces the idea of the innerness of the Duat. The sky goddess Nut is lifting up the sun disk from out of the Duat.

This is the next image I want to discuss:

To link this Egyptian image to Hermetic alchemy here is a quote from the Emerald Tablet: This introduces the next important idea which is the circulation of energy within this system of the causal, subtle and gross. The sun, moon, stars and planets all rotate around the earth (from our perspective). So the known, the created world in which we live, driven by the power of transformation (kheper) rotates constantly. The most visible evidence of this is the daily cycle of the sun. The Egyptians and particularly the Heliopolitan Egyptians thought that understanding this cycle properly was the key to understanding the power that had manifest the world. So they studied this cycle in great detail which they understood in a way which today we would call an alchemical process. Birth, life, death and renewal. In particular in the New Kingdom they set out to map the sun's journey through the night, which they understood as its journey through the hidden realm of the Duat. They produced numerous maps of this nightly journey.

I just didn't understand the phrase crypto-realism. Since I contribute to Wikipedia in another subject area and know how content is produced - I only use it as a quick look up and never for any in depth study. I'm getting some good things out of this book http://www.amazon.com/Buddhist-Thought-Complete-Introduction-Tradition/product-reviews/0415571790/ref=cm_cr_dp_synop?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending#R1D6I8HBICH9MM at present though its a pit patchy also.

The purpose of this topic is clarity on what exactly the Bodhisattva vow means. I have seen on here the oft repeated assertion that a Bodhisattva forgoes or turns back from enlightenment for the sake of sentient beings because of compassion. Most recently in a post by Vmarco on the boredom thread. This is really a distorted version of what the vow means but is one which seems to have the general agreement in the west. This is the bodhisattva vow taken from the Kagyu ngondro text: "Until I reach the essence of enlightenment I take refuge in all the buddhas, and likewise in the dharma and the assembly of bodhisattvas. Just as buddhas of the past gave rise to bodhicitta followed the bodhisattva path, and, through progressive training, established themselves into the stages of the bodhisattvas, likewise, for the benefit of sentient beings, I too, will give rise to bodhicitta, train in the bodhisattva path and stage by stage and gradually, as they did, become proficient." Or in a nutshell ... to benefit sentient beings I will strive towards buddha-hood. In the book "Buddhist Thoughts" by Paul Williams, Anthony Tribe and Alexander Wynne they say this: "It therefore becomes very problematic indeed to portray the bodhisattva, as do so many books in the west, as postponing nirvana." In other words it is hardly possible to work towards buddhahood for the benefit of sentient beings by refusing it or turning away. On the contrary you want to become a buddha i.e. achieve nirvana for the benefit of everyone. So it is just the motivation and not the goal which changes ... from 'I want peace=nirvana for myself' to 'I want to achieve it to benefit everyone (including myself)'. No forgoing, no turning back at all.

Crypto-realism?

i think this sums up the thread so far -

Are there really people in the US who think Hitler was a Communist? ... How do they explain Operation Barbarossa?

Ha ha ... actually the eye test was free ... but then they try to sell you most expensive glasses on the planet.

someone's told me you can get cheap ones from the pharmacy so no need - but that's for the offer.

I know I am turning myself into Mr. Buddha knowitall around this place ... but I have to disagree with your summation of the yanas. Theravadans seek quick liberation form samsara and see the path as a way to nirvana and non-returning. For them the Buddha does not return after nirvana. Mahayana seeks liberation for self and others and has a paranirvana in which the inseperability of samsara and nirvana is recognised through sunyata. Buddhas do return to teach. Vajrayana as you say direct path awakening in one lifetime but basically the same view of nirvana as mahayana.

Yes I do need reading glasses. In real life too - but the optician want 300 euros for a pair ... so I will keep squinting.

Hi, That wiki quote looks a bit dodgy to me - it has no citation and I am unwilling to go back through the history page to see who added it and when. With wiki it could be part of a main edit or just a bit tacked on by someone on the basis of ... a brainwave. I am using Gampopa's "Jewel Ornament ..." as reference and I can see no reference to this idea of being motivated by faith. In fact I think I agree with you that you may well be sustained by faith (in the sense of confidence in the path and masters etc.) up to the 1st Bhumi but if it is what I think it is ... then faith would no longer be a motivation ... but rather you would be spurred on by having made this breakthrough progress. The Bhumi's are not something which I have studied properly or received competent teachings on so I am willing to overruled on this if someone can provide a good source and not opinion.