rex

... [sorry, question on Avishkara Yoga deleted]

And the community responded in kind!

I went to the zoo yesterday and saw loads of different sorts of beings - and that's not including the ones from the unseen classes.

All is not lost. Try these links: http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.daoistcenter.org http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.eng.taoism.org.hk/ If you don't fancy poking around just copy the links from the original post and pop them in the search box here: http://www.archive.org/index.php

A look round here shouldn't be too disappointing: http://web.archive.org/web/*/www.eternalspringtours.com

Thank you for this thread - it has exposed a disquietening subtle visciousness in the community.

The exchanges prompt us into evaluating the benefit or otherwise of passionate concern over iconoclastic cold logic based on contestable facts.

Limitless potential and the impermanence that liberates.

Highlight essential areas of core value. To paraphase William Blake, "It matters not if you're heathen, Turk or Jew, but where Love, Mercy, Pity dwell, there God dwells too".

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Deleted (sorry over-enthusiastic reply)

Right on!

The following is an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid term. The answer by one student was so 'profound' that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well : Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)? Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant. One student, however, wrote the following: First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added. This gives two possibilities: 1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose. 2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over. So which is it? If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, 'It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,' and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct......leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting 'Oh my God.' THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.

Some Instructions from various Saints for the "Prayer of the Heart" were posted on a yahoo group here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Way-of-Light/message/1008 (just past the syncretic intro).

Well there's the six paramitas, 'transcendent perfections', very Buddhist with universal applicability, outlined on this thread http://www.thetaobums.com/index.php?showtopic=7726 Subsequently elaborated on in this post: http://www.thetaobums.com/index.php?s=&amp...ost&p=96832

Apply the four timeless hexagrams - heaven, earth, mastering ptifalls and fire. To quote from Thomas Cleary's introduction to his translation of the Taoist I Ching: "These are held to obtain in some way to all stages of practice. Heaven and earth represent firmness and flexibilty; fostering the mind of Tao and emptying the human mind; ... Mastering pitfalls, overcoming internal and external obstacles, dealing with difficulties and dangers in the mind and the environment, is considered the way in which human development is achieved. Fire stands for illumination, awareness, understanding, which are required all along the way to guide action."

The Twelve Links of Dependent Origination does and this was/is taught along with the Noble Eightfold Path. Is there any particular school of Buddhism that doesn't accept rebirth as a central tenant?

Thanks for highlighting the crucial distinction. I must admit to using the terms interchangeably though this small piece on the differences fits well into this thread: Reicarnation vs. Rebirth

Even though the ego and associated mind states dissolve at death there is still a very subtle form of ignorance known as co-emergent ignorance. Co-emergent ignorance is "the simultaneous arising of cognition and a failure to recognize its actual nature" *1 which gives rise to conceptualisation which in turn kicks off the process of the Twelve Links of Dependent Arising. *1 Quote taken from this teaching by Kalu Rinpoche : http://www.iol.ie/~taeger/mahamud/mahamud.html edited for the usual typos

Sorry I was going to answer this but thought that someone else would. The first paragraph on this page gives a succinct answer: Essential Phowa. A google search also bring ups a lot.

Mantak Chia has been invited to speak at this alchemy conference: http://alchemyconference.com/ DVDs of past conference workshops and lectures are available here.

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As far as I understand there are phowas for transferring into the nirmanakaya, sambhogakya or dharmakaya so maybe there are different possibilities based on the different phowas. In some accounts it is merely the aspiration to be born in Dewachen though in others the state of the subtle body is significant. Best, Rex